It had seemed like a perfect match. She was a

It had seemed like a perfect match.

She was a member of the international jet-set, the daughter of a Swiss industrialist and the former wife of a congressman’s son who was used to the very best money could buy.

He was a major City figure who shared her love of theatre, opera and art and had apparently amassed the wealth to keep her in the manner to which she had become accustomed.

Both had failed marriages behind them.

Horsman, the son of a Birmingham garage owner who attended King Edward school, had married his first wife Jean in 1957.

They met her at the London School of Economics, where the schoolboy rugby international failed to complete a degree in estates management.

The couple had three daughters aged 41, 39 and 27 and Horsman has five grandchildren.

But when his first wife became seriously ill the marriage was put under serious strain and they divorced amicably in the 1970s.

In 1983, Horsman married Ursula Lanz, who he already knew after visiting the art gallery where she worked.

But it was a marriage that was to end in a few minutes of violence when a chance remark turned the normally mild-mannered grandfather into a killer.

As soon as Horsman walked through the door of his wife’s bedroom at 7am she bought up the subject of the pnds stlg 735,000 house she desperately wanted in Sloane Street, Belgravia.

Also on her shopping list was a magnificent pnds stlg 300,000 holiday home in Switzerland.

Horsman had been putting her off moving for four years while they rented the flat because he secretly knew he could not afford the palatial homes his wife had chosen.

BACKGROUND TO TRIAL OF MALCOLM HORSMAN
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Speaking of the Belgravia house, he admitted to detectives: ‘As far as I was concerned it really was a non-possibility.

‘

‘I was hoping it would drop out, but it seemed to be going forward.

‘As far as I was concerned this would have to fall away.

My wife would have to realise there were times when you had to force the issue.

‘

His psychiatrist, Dr Peter Fenwick told the court: ‘She wanted a house in a fashionable part of London and he felt it was more than they could afford.

‘He gave the impression of a successful business manager who frequently made complex business decisions and expected to be obeyed.

‘

For 17 years Horsman had indulged his wife’s love of fine art and beautiful clothes.

He met huge bills for her couture gowns, often imported straight from the catwalks of Paris and Milan.

To snobbish Mrs Horsman, keeping up appearances was everything, the jury heard.

‘I think she was someone who took great pride in her appearance,’ her husband would tell police.

‘It was quite expensive and that was important to her.

‘

He added: ‘My wife has an aspiration to live in Belgravia which is expensive because she feels that gives her a position in society which she feels part of.

‘

Mrs Horsman would only ever fly Club Class and never attended a theatre unless the best seats in the house were assured.

After all, her husband was a former director of the National Youth Theatre and had served on the board of the Gielgud Theatre.

If Horsman objected to his wife’s demands, her response was curt and to the point.

‘She did have what I called a ‘Swiss Miss’ attitude.

She could be abrupt,’ he explained to detectives.

Mrs Horsman also knew the halcyon days when her husband could command huge salaries in the City were over.

He was a former director of asset strippers Slater-Walker, the company which collapsed owing millions in the 1970s.

Horsman was also a founder member of the Bowater Group and worked for Ralli International, but his present company, the Bier Group, had just four employees.

From offices in Theobald Street, West London, the businessman identified undervalued companies and sought financial backing to buy them and then sell on at a profit.

But he admitted his income had dwindled to around pnds stlg 50,000 a year and his wife lost little time in playing on Horsman’s failure.

‘There was a constant drip, drip, of ”You have done it before, why can’t you do it more,” he said.

After years of catering to his wife’s every whim, something snapped when she sat between silk sheets and accused him of being mean.

For a man who was once a huge City figure, the remark was the ultimate insult.

‘It was a question of ‘I am impotent in commercial affairs,’ he said.

‘That was a very, very profound dagger blow.

It was an extraordinarily unfair comment.

I saw myself as a generous person.

‘

Horsman suffocated his wife then made plans to cover up the killing until he realised he could not escape his responsibility.

In court, he claimed he was going ahead with the purchase of the Swiss house and was only baulking at the Belgravia home.

Mrs Horsman’s sister Hedi Kummer, a Swiss magistrate, told the court she had no idea they were looking for a home.

And detectives who flew to Switzerland found Horsman had had not even made a formal inquiry into the Swiss property.

Detective Sergeant Wilf Hodder said: ‘This was a callous attack on his wife because he did not want to buy these two properties.

‘Since then he has tried every means available to him to try and wriggle free of the responsibility for what he has done.

‘

Horsman has lived in West Hartlepool, Cleveland and he has a sister in Todenham, Gloucester.

BACKGROUND TO TRIAL OF MALCOLM HORSMAN
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