An Old Etonian who tried to throw his estranged partner down a 20ft well has been jailed for 24 years.
Douglas Clifton Brown, who was previously found guilty of attempted murder, had argued with Camilla Welby in the car after drinks at a friend’s house then attacked her in August 2023.
Clifton Brown, 56, who was driving, changed routes and instead of heading to her house he drove to High House Estate near Congham, Norfolk, an earlier trial at Norwich Crown Court was told.
The estate, now a wedding venue, has been in his family for generations.
Clifton Brown, of Congham, was said to have become angry and hit Ms Welby in the face on the way to the well and as they arrived nearby.
Judge Alice Robinson noted Ms Welby’s nose was broken and her eye sockets were bruised, saying: ‘On the way you were angry, shouted and repeatedly struck her in the face.’
She told Clifton Brown: ‘You said you were going to take her (Miss Welby) to a disused well at High House, throw her in it then yourself.’
Ms Welby fought him off after pulling her scarf tight around his neck until he could not breathe, the earlier trial was told.
Edward Renvoize, prosecuting, told a sentencing hearing at Norwich Crown Court on Thursday: ‘The case is unusual and the court isn’t often presented with a case where the mechanism of death was as intended.’
He described throwing a person down a well as a ‘sadistic method to bring about the death of somebody’.
Mr Renvoize said Clifton Brown had ‘filled the well with water from a large commercial water butt’.
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He said there was a ‘history of violence or abuse by the defendant towards Ms Welby’.
Ms Welby, reading her victim impact statement from behind a screen at Norwich Crown Court, said she was ‘gaslighted’ during their 15-year relationship.
‘Seeing Mr Clifton Brown in court left me so terrified I ran from the court,’ she said.
Ms Welby said she now suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), adding: ‘When Mr Clifton Brown is released I will always look over my shoulder – I will never feel safe.’
Stan Reiz KC, mitigating, said the incident ‘was an escalation of his (Clifton Brown’s) anger’.
‘It was him in a fit of rage lashing out at his partner,’ he said.
The barrister said Clifton Brown’s ‘depression led him to take the irrational view that he would take his own life as well’.
He said the offence was ‘committed in a domestic abuse context’ but the defendant ‘has his own narrative of how that relationship went’.
Clifton Brown was found guilty of attempted murder after an earlier trial, and had previously admitted causing grievous bodily harm with intent and making a threat to kill.
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