Kettering: Saju Chelavalel jailed for murdering wife and children

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A father who strangled his wife and two children has been jailed for at least 40 years.

Nurse Anju Asok, 35, Jeeva Saju, six, and Janvi Saju, four, were found fatally injured in the family home in Kettering on 15 December 2022.

A judge told Saju Chelavalel he had "squeezed the life out" of his wife while the children screamed for mummy.

Det Insp Simon Barnes said: "There is no amount of time behind bars that will ever be enough for what he did."

Chelavalel, 52, of Petherton Court, admitted murder in April.

The judge, Mr Justice Pepperall, jailed him for life at Northampton Crown Court, and ordered that he must serve a minimum of 40 years.

The bodies of Anju Asok, her son Jeeva Saju and daughter Janvi Saju were discovered after police forced entry into their home in Kettering

Originally from Kerala in India, Chelavalel said he believed his wife was having an affair and claimed he lost control while drunk, killing her at around 22:00 GMT on 14 December at their ground-floor flat.

The court heard Chelavalel had more than four hours "to reflect on whether to kill his children" before using a dressing gown cord to strangle them in the early hours of the following morning.

Ms Asok died at the scene and the children died later in hospital.

Post-mortem examinations found all three victims died from asphyxiation, Northamptonshire Police said.

"While you were squeezing the life out of your wife, your young children were screaming for their mummy," said the judge.

"I cannot be sure if they were eyewitnesses, but it is clear that they heard what was going on and knew that she was being hurt by you."

Saju Chelavalel, 52, admitted to the triple murder of his wife and children

Prosecutor James Newton-Price KC said there was no evidence to support the claim Ms Asok had been unfaithful.

However, an examination of Chelavalel's phone showed that he had been searching dating websites for other women while she was at work.

The court was played an audio recording found on his phone of banging noises followed by the sound of a woman screaming or gasping and a child crying or calling out.

Mr Newton-Price said it was the prosecution's belief that it was a recording of Ms Asok being strangled.

He said the it also captured the sound of a blender being used to make a "toxic" mixture of chocolate and pills intended to send the children - pupils at Kettering Park Infant Academy - to sleep.

'Laying side-by-side'

The court heard that police officers attended the flat after receiving a call from a neighbour who was concerned for the family's welfare.

Ms Asok had failed to turn up for work as an orthopaedic nurse at Kettering General Hospital and the children were not at school.

Body-worn camera footage showed that, after breaking into the flat, officers found Chelavalel holding a knife to his throat. He asked the police to shoot him and said that he wanted to die, before he was Tasered.

The body of Ms Asok was found on the floor of an adjoining bedroom. The couple's children were described in a police statement as "laying perfectly side-by-side on the double bed".

Offering mitigation, defence barrister George Carter-Stephenson KC said the circumstances of the case were tragic in the extreme for relatives of the victims.

He said: "They are also tragic for this particular defendant. Whatever sentence the court imposes on him today he has to live with the knowledge of what he did on that particular night."

In addition to his jail term, Chelavalel was prohibited from contacting any of his victims' family members.

Anju Asok (pictured with Janvi Saju) worked at Kettering General Hospital

Det Insp Simon Barnes from Northamptonshire Police said: "Anju was a mother like many all over the world. She wanted to provide the best possible life she could for her children - Jeeva and Janvi.

"He [Chelavalel] has never fully accounted for what he did, or why, and will now spend the rest of his life with not much else to think about, but that.

"There is no amount of time behind bars that will ever be enough for what he did. His primary role as a husband and a father, was to protect his family from harm. They should have been at their safest, at home, with him, but he destroyed that.

"They leave behind them a devastated family in India, who are struggling to come to terms with what has happened."