Curtis Robb, the orthopaedic surgeon and former Olympic 800-metre runner, has been cleared of controlling and coercive behaviour and intentional suffocation following a trial at Chester Crown Court. The jury returned not guilty verdicts on both charges after roughly four hours of deliberations, and Mr Robb was awarded his legal aid costs.
The allegations
Prosecutors had alleged that between December 2015 and August 2023 Mr Robb, 54, subjected his wife Sarah Robb, a 47-year-old GP, to what they described as “constant criticism”, name-calling and a “dark side” that involved physical violence and cruelty. Ms Robb reported her husband to the police in October 2023, saying that matters had come to a head during a family holiday in the Lake District six months earlier. She told officers that during a row Mr Robb had held a pillow over her face in what she described as an “unprovoked attack”. She said she feared she was “going to end up dead” if she remained in the marriage and called the pillow incident “rock bottom”. She also described feeling she was “living under a dictatorship”.
The court heard detailed accounts of alleged violent incidents, including two that occurred while Ms Robb was pregnant with the couple’s third child. She claimed that Mr Robb “thumped her” on the arm, leaving bruising, and on another occasion punched her on the arm and in the side while he was driving. Beyond the physical allegations, Ms Robb said her husband called her a “manipulative bitch” and “neurotic”, claimed she could not cope as a mother, and belittled her professional role as a GP. The prosecution argued that despite appearing as a “happy and successful couple” to outsiders, Mr Robb’s behaviour represented a pattern of control and coercion.
The defence
Mr Robb, who competed for Great Britain in the 800 metres at the 1992 Barcelona and 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games and was a three-time British champion, firmly denied the allegations. When interviewed by detectives the day after Ms Robb reported him, he told them: “My wife is never happy which is why we are in this scenario.” He told the court that he had been the one to suffer verbal and physical abuse from his wife, describing himself as a “very passive person”. Asked directly about the pillow incident, he said: “Have I heck. She remonstrated with me, I pushed her back.” His defence barrister, Martine Snowdon, suggested that it was Ms Robb who was the controlling partner and that Mr Robb had never admitted to assaulting her. Mr Robb also told police that he felt he had been treated very badly but did not mind as long as the children were fine, and claimed his wife would “come at me and start hitting me” and had thrown water over him.
The verdict and aftermath
The couple met as junior doctors in Sheffield, married in 2010 and went on to have three children. Mr Robb, a consultant orthopaedic surgeon based at Warrington Hospital and also practising at Spire Cheshire Hospital in Stretton, was suspended from patient-facing duties after he was charged with the offences in April 2025. Following the jury’s not-guilty verdicts on both the controlling and coercive behaviour charge and the charge of intentional suffocation, Mr Robb was awarded his legal aid costs.
