Revenge by creosote: Builder wrecks county cricketer's flat after wife confesses affair



Believing his wife had been having an affair with a county cricket player half his age, John Matthews felt there was a score to settle.

So the 50-year-old builder went round to the Somerset batsman's house and 'undid' all the improvements he had recently carried out.

Matthews had been employed by Neil Edwards, 24, to carry out some work on his new flat - and had a set of keys to the property.

But a month ago, 'blinded by anger' at the alleged affair, the father of three went into the flat, sawed his supposed rival's bed in half, poured creosote on the furniture, scratched his plasma TV and poured expandable foam down the lavatories and bath.

Anger: Husband John Matthews used the tools of his trade for revenge

Batsman: Neil Edwards' toilet was filled with expandable foam



Then he left a note at the £200,000 property informing his target that this was just the beginning. In it, he said his wife Pamela, 48, had confessed to an affair. 'If you play with fire you can expect to get burned,' he wrote.

Matthews caused about £9,000 of damage at Edwards's two-bedroom flat, in Taunton. It has been uninhabitable since.

This week, a court heard that Matthews had considered Mr Edwards a family friend who had been kind enough to invite his wife and daughter to cricket matches in Taunton.

But Matthews was later told that the relationship had gone further.

He told police: 'Edwards had been having an affair with my wife and I tried to put an end to it. I still had a door key from when I carried all the work out there and I decided to undo all the work I had done.



Allegations: Wife Pamela is at the centre of affair claims



'I pulled down the curtains and took down a mirror. I was going to smash the toilets with a sledge-hammer. I went to the van to get a Stanley knife to cut up the curtains and I noticed I had some creosote in there. If I hadn't had it there I wouldn't have used it.

'I poured it on the bed and I cut it up because I didn't want him using it, and I poured some more on the settee.

'I filled the toilets with expanding foam but a piece fell off the foam gun and chipped the bath. That is how it was broken, I didn't mean to do it. I may have scratched the television accidentally. I was blinded with anger.'

Prosecuting, Jeremy Oliver told Taunton Deane Magistrates' Court how Mr Edwards found a note nailed to his front door, reading: 'Pam has told me all about the affair. I told you I would smash you and your house if it carried on.'

In his statement to the police, Mr Edwards, a former England under-19 player, who was playing for Somerset against South Africa at the time of the crime, said he previously got on well with Matthews and his wife.



But more than a year ago he became aware of rumours circulating in his home town of Penzance, Cornwall, that he and Mrs Matthews were having an affair.

The court was told Mr Edwards had no interest in her 'in that way' and denied any affair, although it also emerged that Mrs Matthews and her daughter visited him at the flat.

Matthews pleaded guilty to causing criminal damage. He was released on bail and will be sentenced this month.

Samuel Cooper, defending, said: 'Mr Matthews and his wife are trying to pursue their marriage once more. This was an unfortunate chapter which happened at a time which was not a happy episode in their lives.'

Matthews and his wife, who live together in Penzance, and have been married 27 years, declined to comment.

