Ex-CPS Lawyer Sentenced In Courthouse She Once Prosecuted Criminals

"I'll Cut Your Throat": Anne

A Crown Prosecution Service lawyer, who flung her 69 year-old mother-in-law onto a sofa shouting: “If you open your mouth I’ll cut your throat,” was sentenced today.

Solicitor Anne Murgai, 42, dominated the £375,000 house her husband bought with his mother and put the pensioner in fear of another assault the next day.

She was convicted of both incidents, despite fighting the case during an all-day trial, and was ordered to complete 80 hours community service.

“She did not want me to come, she did not like my presence,” petite Usha Kariholoo told Croydon Magistrates Court, explaining she was attacked during a row over chores.

“She came to me and said: ‘I’ll show you,’ and pushed me three times and fortunately I fell on the sofa. I could have fallen on the floor for all she cared,” added the mother-in-law.

“She hit me two or three times on the shoulder and said: ‘I’ll kill you.’ I was shivering.”

The pensioner had just bought the house with son Rakesh Kariholoo, 45, for his wife and son Andrew, 2, and they were joined by Murgai’s 80 year-old mother.

Murgai, of 70 Ridgewell Close, Lower Sydenham was found guilty of assaulting Usha at the matrimonial home at nearby 25 Elfrida Crescent on September 26 and 27, last year.

She shook her head in the dock of the courthouse, where she has prosecuted hundreds of cases as the magistrates announced their decision.

"Disbelief": Rakesh

“I also shook my head in disbelief at what she did to my mother,” said Rakesh afterwards. “I wondered: ‘How has it come to this?’

Usha told the trial: “I was not allowed to touch or feed the child and there were arguments between her and Rakesh, with her telling him: ‘You don’t do this and you don’t do that.’

“I told her Rakesh is doing enough and she should help him. She was not working, she was sitting at home all day and did not like that I called her a housewife.

“Rakesh had two jobs at the time and she was telling him: ‘You don’t do the garden, you don’t do the toilets.’

“I told her Rakesh is doing everything and she should also help and that it was very honourable to be a housewife, but that created a reaction,” added Usha.

The “housewife” remark triggered the assault, said Usha, denying Murgai’s claim she kicked her three times in the stomach while shouting and swearing aggressively.

The next day Usha was hanging her son’s laundry in the back garden. “She had a fist and I knew she was going to push me again, she tried to push me.

“She said: ‘I’ll show you,’ and came forward. If I fell on the ground I could have broken my head.”

Usha told the court she heard Murgai tell her husband: “When you’re not here you’ll see what I’ll do to your mum.”

Rakesh slept on a downstairs couch and left his mother in a hotel while he was at work, calling the police eight days later.

Sofa: Usha

“I did not want to call the police, it was my son’s idea,” said Usha. “He couldn’t take it any longer.” 

Rakesh witnessed both assaults and said: “The first time she was shaking and pushing her at the same time.

“The next day in the garden my mum was shouting: ’Please neighbours help me, she’s going to kill me.”

Murgai told the court her husband and his mother physically tried to push her out of the house and twice snatched a phone out of her hand when she tried to call 999.

“It’s a load of nonsense, it’s all lies. I was told in a lie the house was for myself, Rakesh and Andrew.

“She was shouting, swearing and being abusive while she was putting the laundry out. It was a set-up by her, she knows there’s CCTV in the garden.

“That home was a toxic environment and Usha wants to control her son and married life. She sees her life as with Rakesh, she’s married to him.”

The defendant said Usha told her: “I will slit your throat and kill you if you don’t get out of the house.”

Murgai now lives with her mother and has objected to her ex-husband having any contact with Andrew.

District Judge Kamlesh Rana told Murgai, who mow lives on benefits: “An assault on a lady of this age in her own home, where she is entitled to feel safe, must be reflected with some degree of seriousness.”

Murgai, who still protests her innocence, was placed on twelve months probation and also ordered to pay £200 costs and £100 compensation to Usha.

She must also comply with a twelve-month restraining order, prohibiting contact with her mother-in-law and attending the former matrimonial home.