Indian-origin man sentenced to 16 years jail in UK for bludgeoning wife to death

Devendra Singh who battered his wife Charlotte Smith to death last year with an ornamental elephant has been reportedly sentenced life imprisonment in UK for at least 16 years.

According to the Mirror, Singh used 'off the scale' violence to attack Smith when she demanded a divorce for being unhappy with their relationship.

Senior pathologist Olaf Biedrzycki, who examined the body of Smith, said that her injuries were among the worst he had ever seen during his 20-year career as her skull was repeatedly 'smashed' and 'shattered' with the wooden elephant.

Biedrzycki said that the degree of force used to inflict the injuries on head and face was of 'extreme' nature.

The report said that Smith's body was found three days later after she had been killed by Singh left her body on the lounge floor of their house in Laddeedge and threw evidence, including the wooden elephant over the garden fence into a field before fleeing to London.

Singh admitted to the killing but denied having murdered her on the base of 'loss of control'.

Charlotte and Singh first met each other on a holiday in Goa, India in 2008 and got married in 2010 and later Singh moved to the UK.

Detective Inspector Glyn Pattinson, who led the inquiry for Staffordshire Police said that Singh moved to England to live with Charlotte and after an initial period of being happy newlyweds, there began deterioration in the couple's marriage.

Smith's devastated parents said that they had wanted justice for their daughter and the perpetrator of the crime serve sentence in the jail for what he has done, adding that no matter what length of the jail term is, it will never compensate the loss of their daughter, the report added.