A former Army major who slashed his former wife’s throat over a bitter divorce settlement was jailed for 25 years today.
Jonathan Creak, 51, drove more than 140 miles to confront ex Rhiannon in a country lane.
He then launched the ‘chilling and vicious’ attack with a Stanley knife while screaming: ‘You need to die’.
Ms Creak suffered serious wounds to her windpipe, neck, back, breast and leg that left her needing emergency surgery.
As Creak was arrested and ordered to lie down outside his van on a busy dual carriageway later that day, police bodycam footage showed him laughing and telling officers: ‘You don’t get much action.’
The callous defendant claimed he had no memory of the incident, which he said was triggered when he went to confront his ex over her demands for a share of his Army pension after their ten-year marriage fell apart.
But he was convicted of attempted murder and inflicting grievous bodily harm with intent following a trial.
Jailing him today for 25 years plus an extended licence of four years, Judge Katharine Moore accepted the defendant had suffered mental health issues including depression and anxiety which were possibly symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.
But she said he could not rely on ‘provocation’ as a defence and that he was ‘perfectly capable of …understanding the consequences of your actions’.
She added: ‘You clearly harbour grudges and are motivated by a sense of resentment.’
The length of the sentence took into account the risk he posed to members of the public ‘particularly women with whom you have had a relationship and more specifically who you think have wronged you’.
In a victim impact statement read to the court, Ms Creak said: ‘The emotional impact of the attempt on my life has been unimaginable for me and my family.
‘I have been diagnosed with PTSD and hyper-vigilance. I haven’t slept for more than a couple of hours a day since July, I am scared to be alone or in my partner’s home, the house where I was followed from.’
She described her ex-husband as ‘a calculated and very dangerous man’.
During the trial, Norwich Crown Court heard how the Afghanistan veteran used a Stanley knife to ‘repeatedly slash the flesh’ of his ex in Hardwick, Norfolk, on July 6 last year while she was on her way to muck out a friend’s horses.
Cambridge-educated Ms Creak had become aware that she was being followed by a white van on the A140 road heading south from Norwich and it continued to tail her as she turned off into a lane in Hardwick.
She became ‘increasingly anxious’ and pulled over at the side of the road and saw her ex-husband’s company logo on the side of the van as he drove past.
Creak, who had driven from his home in Woodstock, Oxfordshire, doubled back and parked his van ‘nose to nose’ with her car.
Both then got out of their vehicles, with Ms Creak being ‘unsurprisingly baffled’ about why he was following her before he produced the blade, prosecutor Claire Matthews said.
‘She recalled hearing a metallic click as if something was being opened. He was telling her that he had nothing left to lose. Her instinct was to run but he told her that he could catch her,’ Ms Matthews told the jury.
‘What followed was a chilling and vicious attack on Rhiannon Creak in that country lane.’
Ms Creak’s wounds were described as ‘grave’ and ‘serious’ and included an eight-inch cut to her neck and a five-inch wound beneath her breast. She needed a blood transfusion and emergency surgery to her windpipe and neck.
Creak called his fitness instructor partner Sophie Carter – with whom he has three young children – after fleeing the scene in the van and ‘told her that he had killed Rhiannon’, prompting her to call the police.
An officer arrived at her home and picked up the phone when Creak called again, hearing words to the effect of: ‘I have done it. I have killed my ex-wife.’
Creak told the officer that he was in the Bedford area while heading back home and was pulled over and arrested on suspicion of attempted murder.
In a prepared statement given to police, he complained how he had divorced his ex-wife in 2022 but ‘since then she has stonewalled proceedings by not agreeing to any settlement’.
He added she had ‘become even more bitter’ as a result of his new relationship, saying: ‘I believe she tried to destroy me after I gave her everything.’
Creak insisted he had not intended to kill or seriously injure her and had just been trying to make her answer him.
But Ms Matthews told jurors: ‘Sophie Carter describes some domestic issues in the period leading up to this which, the prosecution say, caused him to be very angry indeed.
‘The prosecution say that Mr Creak intended to kill Rhiannon that morning.’
During the sentencing today, it emerged Creak had got into an argument with Ms Carter and broke some of her ribs by pushing her against a wall.
Ms Creak met the defendant in 2006 when she was in the Officers’ Training Corps as a student at Cambridge University and he was an instructor for the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers.
They moved in together and decided to marry when he was posted with the Army to Belize, with the wedding taking place in July 2008.
She returned from Belize in 2011 and wanted to train as a physiotherapist so she could work at different bases where he was posted but he was reluctant to support her financially and they started divorce proceedings in 2012.
They got back together after he was posted to Germany and then Afghanistan, despite a decree nisi having been granted but split up again in 2018 while living in married quarters at the Apache helicopter base in Wattisham, Suffolk.
Describing the attack, she said: ‘He pulled something out of his right pocket and I got the impression it was a weapon of some sort with a blue or black handle and heard a metallic noise like a scraping. He said “I have got nothing left to lose”.’
As Creak attacked her, she said he was yelling: ‘You could have just accepted the settlement.’
Ms Creak, 43, who had not had any contact with him other than through solicitors since 2019, added: ‘As he was slashing at my throat, he said “You need to die, you need to die”. I could not make a noise anymore. It was just blood and bubbling.’
Creak, who was medically discharged from the Army in October 2021 after 29 years’ service following a series of mental health assessments, admitted assault causing GBH and possessing a bladed article before the trial.
Detective Inspector Duncan Woodhams said after the sentencing: ‘This has been a terrifying ordeal for Rhiannon and her family. It has had a profound impact on her physical and psychological wellbeing.
‘Nothing will ever erase the experience for Rhiannon, but we hope that the sentence today ensures her perpetrator will have to serve some justice for his unthinkable actions.’
