My best friend was killed by her controlling husband

It was an ordinary Monday morning in 2010 when my life changed for ever. I came out of a meeting and saw a load of missed calls and messages from friends. It was the news I’d always feared: ‘Jo’s gone missing.’ Five days later, the body of my best friend and soulmate was found by police.

The news was so devastating that it was almost a physical emotion. I was cold with total shock, and hit with a deep pang of dread in my stomach as I imagined what had happened. But this was nothing compared to the unimaginable horror when my worst fears were confirmed: Jo had been bludgeoned to death by her husband, Rob.

Jo and Rob had met on holiday in 1998. She was in her 30s and instantly attracted to the handsome and charming pilot. But as soon as they got married, it was like a switch flipped. She spent their honeymoon wondering how she could have married someone who belittled her and shouted at hotel staff. But not long after, she discovered she was pregnant and decided to stay with him. They went on to have two children together, a son and a daughter.

I met Jo a few years later through our children. She was so sparkly and warm and we became best friends. We spent hours discussing Rob’s behaviour. He was a British Airways captain, so was away a lot, but he kept tabs on her. He put a tracker in her car and would check the burglar alarm log to monitor her movements. Once he told her he’d dreamt about killing the children with an axe. At the time, everyone thought of domestic abuse as physical violence, so we couldn’t see how sinister this pattern of controlling behaviour really was.

She became more and more frightened of him, until one night she said he threatened to kill her with a knife held to her throat. She pleaded with him to consider their children, and he eventually backed down. After that, she decided their marriage was over. But he made a clean break impossible: he wouldn’t pick the children up on time, or would put his foot in the doorway when she tried to shut the door. The wires for the CCTV on her house were cut twice in the six months before she was killed.

On Hallowe’en, a week before their final divorce hearing, we chatted on the phone in the afternoon until 3pm. I tried her landline a few hours later, but it wouldn’t ring. I texted: ‘You gasbag, who are you talking to on the phone all this time?’

I had no idea what was really going on. At 4pm, Rob had dropped the children, then 10 and nine, back at home and, after they ran into the playroom, he took a hammer he’d hidden in one of their bags, and hit Jo around the head at least 14 times. He disconnected the phone, ripped out the CCTV and put her plastic wrapped body into the boot of the car, then got the children and drove off. After dropping them at his girlfriend’s house, he drove to a grave he’d dug months before in Windsor Great Park and buried her.

He was arrested after the children didn’t turn up for school, and following days of intensive questioning finally admitted what he’d done. He was found not guilty of murder due to diminished responsibility, and instead convicted of manslaughter. He’ll be released in October 2023.

It has been almost impossible to put my life back together. I couldn’t work for three years with the trauma, and was treated for complex PTSD.

I had to do something positive to change things in the better, so in 2013 I set up the Joanna Simpson Foundation with Jo's mother, Diana Parkes. The charity focuses on child victims and witnesses of domestic abuse, like Jo's children, and helps them to rebuild their lives and recover. Our campaigning led to the first legal guidance to prosecutors in domestic homicide trials, and our meeting with the Duchess of Cornwall in 2016 with Safelives was instrumental in her deciding to raise awareness of domestic abuse.

Refuge is a great organisation delivering support to 7,000 women and children every day.  However, domestic abuse remains the biggest social issue impacting women and children today - and there is much work to be done. With the forthcoming Domestic Abuse Bill we hope the response will be transformed in this country - Refuge itself will be transforming to meet these challenges in partnership with others, and won't rest until domestic abuse is eliminated.

I’m passionate about raising awareness of the signs of psychological control in a relationship as well as the impact on children from abuse. In June 2020, I became the Chair of Refuge, a charity which supports women and children who are victims of domestic abuse, and this year is being supported by the Telegraph's Christmas Charity Appeal. I imagine the difference it could have made to Jo’s life if she had called their helpline. She might have been able to realise what was happening before it was too late.

As told to Helen Chandler-White

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