Dreamboys stripper group's founder sobs as he's jailed for attempted murder of his wife with an axe
12 January 2023, 13:42
The founder of the male stripper group Dreamboys has been found guilty of attempted murder after trying to kill his wife with an axe.
David Richards ambushed his wife Alex Alam after seeing her kiss Towie's Kirk Norcross, who she FaceTimed for help following Richards' attack.
She told him: "I am dying — he has killed me, he has done me.”
Ms Alam, who needed 100 stitches, begged Mr Norcross: “Please get my kids. He is going to finish us off," the Sun reports.
Richards, 42, had been waiting for his wife for hours when she took her dog outside of her home in Essex, while their children were inside the property.
He attacked Ms Alam, 32, leaving her in a "bloodbath" with a fractured skull and cuts to her face and scalp, judge David Turner KC told Chelmsford Crown Court.
Ms Alam, who appeared in court, said in an emotional statement: "I've been utterly betrayed beyond belief by the person I chose to have children with, turning my life upside down."
In her victim impact statement, read by prosecutor William Carter, she added: "The scars are a constant reminder of what he did to me."
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Mr Carter told the court how Richards took an axe, dry suit and cable ties to the Essex address on April 3, 2022. "The weapon was taken to the scene and used," he said.
"Plainly there was planning, the buying of the axe, the dry suit, the cable ties. Clearly pre-meditation prior to the night and on the night.
"You will remember he waited a number of hours dressed as he was, with the weapon, waiting for (Ms Alam's friend) Mr Norcross to depart."
The attempted murder was described by the judge as a "hideous culmination of the breakdown some 18 months earlier of your family relationships".
From autumn of 2019, there had been number of police reports accusing Richards of domestic assault, harassment and stalking.
He described Richards as being "obsessive" and having a "jealous mindset". The judge added: "Your dream home, family and lifestyle to which you had aspired had very sadly unravelled and left you depressed, isolated and angry.
"This crime was planned and prepared for. A hatchet or hatchets were bought, as were a dry suit, boots, gloves and cable ties."
Richards, who sobbed through parts of today's hearing, told police he had done "the most stupid thing I had done in my life", the judge said.
Judge Turner sentenced Richards to 27 years in prison and made a restraining order until further order.
