Gardener facing life in jail after a jury took less than 27 minutes to find him guilty of breaking the neck of his teacher lover after she threatened to leave him

A gardener faced a life sentence in less than 27 minutes after a jury found him guilty of breaking the neck of his teacher lover, whom he threatened to leave.

Trudi Burgess, 57, was paralyzed from the chest down when Robert Easom, 56, flew into an ‘uncontrollable’ rage and attacked her ‘brutally’.

Described as a ‘monster’ and strong like The Incredible Hulk, Easom pinned the mother-of-two face down to her bed and put his entire body weight on her neck until it broke.

In harrowing testimony recorded from her intensive care hospital bed, Ms Burgess described hearing her spine crack and then her body slowly going numb.

Easom admitted causing the injury that left Ms Burgess paralyzed and in need of 24-hour care, but denied intending to cause her serious harm and told police: ‘I love Trudi more than life itself.’

But it took the jury at Preston Crown Court less than half an hour to find the cowardly Easom, who refused to give evidence in court, guilty of causing grievous bodily harm with intent.

Easom also admitted two charges of assault but it can now be revealed he also pleaded guilty to coercive and controlling behavior throughout the couple’s eight-year relationship, before the start of the four-day trial last week.

He will be sentenced in February.

Speaking on behalf of Ms Burgess’s family after the verdict, Ms Burgess’s brother-in-law, Tim Bashall, told the Mail: ‘We are relieved that the jury reached the right verdict and justice was done.

‘But there is no winner in this case, there is no joy. Trudi will not get her life back and still has to live with her scars for the rest of her life.’

Easom, 56, a landscape gardener, refused to testify in his own defense

Ms. Burgess, a former secondary school teacher who taught French and Spanish, was told she would never walk again.

Prosecutor Sarah Magill told the jury that Mrs Burgess was grieving the death of her husband Craig from a brain tumour, and was “emotionally vulnerable” when she met Easom, who was her sister’s gardener, in 2017.

Initially their relationship was loving and passionate, but over time Easom became abusive, violent and controlling.

Once, during a holiday in 2021, he wrapped Ms Burgess’s head in a sheet until she could not breathe.

On another occasion, in January, on her way home from dinner with friends, he head-butted her when she complained that they couldn’t host them again because they didn’t have enough plates or cutlery.

By February 17 this year, Ms Burgess had had enough of Easom’s abusive behavior and ‘finally mustered the courage to leave.’

She spent the night at Easom’s house in Chipping, in the Ribble Valley, near Chorley, and as they drank a cup of tea in bed he asked her if she had made cottage pies for dinner, which was her usual Monday routine.

He responded by saying that she would not cook for him and that the relationship was over.

But Ms Magill said Easom, who had three children from a previous relationship, including a son who was incidentally paralyzed in a car crash, flew into a ‘blind’ and ‘uncontrollable’ rage.

“He grabbed my head and pushed it down with both hands, it felt like he was folded into my chest,” Ms Burgess said, sobbing in the evidence video played to the jury.

Mrs Burgess and her late husband Craig, who died of a brain tumor in 2016. The couple met when they were both 17 years old. They were in a successful band and signed a record deal together.

Mr and Mrs Burgess were together for almost 30 years before he was diagnosed with brain cancer

‘I’ve never felt anything like this, I felt my neck snap and I started to feel myself going numb.

‘I think I screamed but… I had no voice, he just kept folding my head in, in, and in.

‘ I kept thinking, ‘It’s going to stop now’ and ‘I’m going to die.’

‘He kept doing this and the whole time he was saying: ‘Shut up, shut up, I’ll shut you up, stop talking, stop talking.

I was trying to say, ‘You’re killing me’ (but) I couldn’t speak. ‘I thought I was dying.’

He later told Easom: ‘Oh my God, I can’t feel anything in my body, you’ve ruined both our lives.’

He initially didn’t believe her but she begged him to call an ambulance and eventually called 999, telling the operator: ‘He fell out of bed and landed really badly.’

He later told police the pair had been involved in a ‘playfight gone wrong’.

Defender Tobias Smith said that his client now accepts that both of these allegations are ‘lies’.

Judge Robert Altham told Easom that he planned to read Ms Burgess’ victim impact statement to the court during her sentencing hearing in February and that it would reflect badly on her if she did not attend.

The maximum sentence GBH can receive with intent is life imprisonment.

The court heard Ms Burgess spent more than three months in intensive care and is still receiving rehabilitation in a specialist unit for spinal cord injuries.

‘He’s in constant pain,’ Ms Magill said. ‘He describes it as if he were in armor two sizes too small.

‘He can lift his arms using his shoulders, but he cannot move his fingers.

‘He needs help to drink, he cannot carry out simple daily body functions such as coughing, he wants healthcare professionals to help him.

‘However, there is no cognitive impairment in his mind. He is as outspoken and level-headed as he was before this incident.’

Ms Burgess’s two children, Gina and Jackson, are now fundraising via an online platform GoFundMe Page for ongoing maintenance.

‘Our mother is a special woman: warm, kind, intelligent and endlessly creative,’ Jackson said.

‘The last 10 months have been hell. My mother was on a ventilator in intensive care for three months; He could not breathe, speak or move on his own.

‘He was then transferred to a specialist spinal cord injury unit where he received on-going care for seven months and worked to regain the independence he was able to regain.

‘My mother’s future needs are a bit overwhelming; That’s why (unfortunately) we’re asking for help.

‘We are so grateful that we still have our mother. We just want to make the rest of your life as comfortable, safe and connected as possible.’