Inside the crumbling marriage of a ‘love rat’ pilot accused of murder

In the cold night air outside his home, Robert Crawford looks up from the bottom of a retaining wall, the glow of a police officer’s torch illuminating his face.

His wife, Frances, lies lifeless in her floral pyjamas on the grass. Her hand rests on her chest, and her right ugg boot is close to her leg. Blood runs from her nose across her face.

An orange ride-on mower is next to her, overturned on its left side, its wheel turned hard to the right and stuck in reverse.

Footage from responding officers, filmed in the early hours of July 30, 2024 and played to a Supreme Court jury this week, shows the former Royal Australian Air Force pilot explaining the lead-up to his wife’s death.

He has pleaded not guilty to murder. His defence team says Frances died in a tragic accident.

Prosecutors say the 49-year-old staged the scene to look like she was killed when the mower she was riding rolled over the wall.

The RAAF pilot was a “love rat”, the prosecution says, whose wife discovered his double life. In admissions to the court, Crawford had a string of extramarital affairs with at least 10 women over a decade, including three air force colleagues.

He killed Frances, either through strangulation or with blunt force, so he would not lose millions of dollars in a divorce, the prosecution says.

Taking into account settlement finances and Frances’ life insurance policy, her untimely death would become very profitable for Crawford, at about $5.4 million, the jury heard.

“Robert Crawford loves money,” Crown prosecutor Chris Cook told the court earlier in the week, “… loved it so much that he killed for it.”

The footage shows Crawford climbing back up the retaining wall in his pyjama shorts and a jumper, on what paramedics would later tell his trial was an “incredibly cold night” in the Upper Lockyer, on the family’s sprawling 40-hectare property, estimated to be worth up to $2.6 million.

Crawford told a Triple Zero operator in a 3.37am call that he believed his wife was moving the mower because she was worried about sprinklers coming on.

By 4.27am, Crawford is at the kitchen table, a grey blanket draped over his shoulders. He starts to cry.

Sergeant Glen Thomas asks him: “What happened here tonight?”

Crawford is softly spoken, often inaudible in the footage, as he talks about how he discovered his wife. A paramedic prepares him a cup of tea as he rocks forward, his forehead almost touching the table.

He tells the officer he went to bed about 11.30pm after studying. He says he believed Frances was watching a Korean show on Netflix.

When he woke up and discovered his wife wasn’t in bed, he checked the house, calling “where are you”, he says.

“I checked the rooms, the guest rooms and stuff, couldn’t see anything there, couldn’t see anything out the front, couldn’t see anything,” he says.

He talks about taking the mower out to fix the battery, and Frances asking him to move it because their sprinklers were due to come on overnight. Text messages on the pair’s phones discussing the mower have been tendered to the court.

Crawford explains he went outside, aided by the torch on his phone, and saw the mower had fallen over the retaining wall.

“All I could see was her legs,” he sobs, gesturing with his hands.

He says he managed to pull his wife out from under it.

In the Triple Zero call, Crawford tells the operator “she is so cold”. A pump, pump, pump noise can be heard in the background as he attempts to resuscitate her.

A marriage marred by affairs

Just a year before her alleged murder, Frances Crawford stood in her kitchen, a tissue in her hand, surrounded by concerned police.

Her husband lingered outside, dressed in a grey bath robe, his RAAF flight suit peeking out from underneath.

Frances was measured and articulate as she told officers what had happened early on July 20, 2023.

Though still married, the Crawfords had separated, and she had changed the locks. But her husband broke in that morning, pulling louvres off their patio window.

Frances became emotional as she told officers how her husband had cheated on her.

“I have forgiven and forgiven and forgiven, I cannot keep going,” she says in the body-worn footage shown to the jury.

“For me,” her voice breaks. “I can’t live with that any more. I don’t see that his personality is going to change, and I’ve spent 25 years trying to make peace, trying to make it work.”

The footage is a glimpse inside a disintegrating marriage, marred by Crawford’s extramarital affairs.

The recording is also some of the last words police have of Frances explaining her husband’s actions.

Dressed in a suit, Crawford this week sat within arm’s length of his wife’s family and friends, separated only by glass surrounding the courtroom dock.

Each day the pilot arrived flanked by lawyers, and left surrounded by cameras and journalists as he made his way to a waiting Mercedes-Benz.

And as one woman after another testified about his infidelity, he maintained his composure.

He’d messaged a RAAF colleague, Sarah Woodsell, with whom he had had an intimate relationship, about how he would “still shoot for reconciliation” and not divorce his wife because there was “more sport to be had. Just kidding. I hope this calms down soon”, the court heard.

In another message, he said: “It’s like a sport. It’ll be fun? Haha.”

When the Crawfords reconciled in the months before Frances’ death, he agreed to a set of boundaries. These included Crawford avoiding interactions with females, telling his wife his whereabouts, attending church with her, and not lying.

The jury was shown a scoresheet Frances had been keeping on her husband the week before her death. She would tick off daily activities, which included the days they had sex, as well as prayer, meditation and sharing feelings.

Around this time, their children expressed concern for their mother. Youngest son, Jake, who is now also in the RAAF, told the court: “I was distressed for her, scared for her safety. None of us kids wanted her in an environment with my dad.”

Frances also told loved ones she lived in fear, the court was told.

The weekend before her death, the pair travelled to Kingscliff, staying at the luxury Peppers Resort and Spa. Frances had rated her husband a “7” on the Saturday, when they had argued, and an “8” when they returned home.

Pages upon pages of messages displayed to the jury showed Crawford discussing his feelings with other women.

In some exchanges with Woodsell, the pair openly discussed Frances, including what they would do if Frances ended up contacting Woodsell. In one, Woodsell referred to Frances as a narcissist, and sent Crawford information about the condition.

Frances had been suspicious about her husband having affairs, and talked with friends and family about it. But when she discovered flights for two people had been booked to Queenstown in New Zealand, she suspected one of the tickets was for Woodsell.

“He did not let on that it was not me. He let her believe it was me,” Woodsell told the court.

Another lover

In reality, Crawford had booked a flight for his new lover – another colleague, Antonia Guterres.

He had begun a relationship with the younger woman, who eventually fell under Crawford’s direct chain of command in mid-2023, about the time he was separating from Frances.

In a message to Woodsell, Crawford wrote: “I didn’t tell her about Toni [Guterres] because you know what she’d do … she’d start abusing Toni and calling work … She’s so psycho. But anyways.”

Woodsell told the court Crawford had gushed that he was “basically in love” with Guterres, and they had discussed having children. He also spoke of how he could reverse a vasectomy.

Guterres herself took to the stand, becoming emotional as she told the jury how her life became indelibly entwined with Crawford’s, while she battled other work issues within the RAAF.

Crawford had repeatedly offered her help, encouraging words, and asked her to catch up, including for coffee and to paint. At one point, Crawford had asked her if she wanted to move with him to Papua New Guinea, the court heard.

Over his time with Guterres, he told her he felt “trapped” at home, “broken and really struggling”. He told Guterres his wife was bipolar, and “off her meds”.

While Guterres’ and Crawford’s affair was brief, Crawford was still tearfully expressing feelings for her while at a work event on June 25, 2024.

Almost a month later, he sent a message to Guterres, saying: “Ant can you promise me something … Can you try to do one fun thing or something that you enjoy each day.”

Days later, his wife was dead.

Crawford’s relationship with Guterres came after he had a two-year relationship with another pilot, Emily Renshaw, which began in 2020, the court was told.

Renshaw said Crawford did not want to end his marriage out of fear from being exiled from the church, and a divorce would delay his retirement plans.

Two days before her death, on the weekend away at Kingscliff, Frances confronted her husband, saying “all the girls [were] to stroke your ego”, and calling him a “f—ing cheat” and “a miserable excuse for a human being”.

According to testimony this week, Crawford told paramedics of the great weekend he and Frances had just spent at Kingscliff in the minutes after they had found her dead.

Graphic images of her lying on the grass were shown to the jury.

One paramedic told the court the accused talked to his unresponsive wife in an endearing way, and about moving the mower. “Why did you shift it? I would’ve moved it for you,” he could be heard saying.

At one point, he tried to interlace his fingers with hers, the court heard.

Paramedics said the coldness of her body made it obvious she could not be revived. One said he touched the mower to see if it was still warm, but it was also cold.

Frances Crawford was declared dead at 4.05am.

The jury is expected to hear from medical experts next week, as the trial before Justice Lincoln Crowley continues.

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