Guilty verdict for controlling Windsor dad who terrorised family

A controlling dad who subjected his family to years of violence and manipulation has been found guilty of assault and cruelty to children. 

Rachid Khadla from Windsor used a regime of violence to control his family but his reign of terror was brought to light when his teenage son told police that his father had attacked him.

The 56-year-old's son told police he was punched in the chest and strangled. 

Statements from his two other children, now adults, revealed that the outburst marked just one incident in a scheme of abuse he inflicted on all three of them.

A jury at Reading Crown Court heard how Khadla would easily fly into fits of rage with his children and slap their hands with a spoon, punch them, throw things at them, criticise and threaten them. He controlled what activities they could do around the house and what friends they could talk to.

On one occasion, Khadla threw a chair at his then nine-year-old daughter, causing a permanent ear injury. As a result of his own obsession with fitness and diet, he also forced her to sign a document to say she would “do lots of exercise” so as to “never get fat, even until I die”.

Khadla denied any mistreatment but was found guilty by a jury at Reading Crown Court on Friday and convicted of two counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm and three counts of cruelty to a person under 16. 

Senior Crown Prosecutor Bill Khindey said: “It was the Crown Prosecution Service’s case that Khadla crossed the line above being merely a strict disciplinarian parent and that his regime of physical and psychological abuse amounted to criminal conduct.

“The three siblings should have felt loved and protected by their father, but Khadla chose to abuse their trust and forced them to live in fear of him.

“I would like to thank them for their bravery in recounting many years of difficult memories during this trial. It’s their evidence that has secured today’s convictions.”

He is due to be sentenced at Reading Crown Court on April 16.