The wife of a former SAS soldier charged with suffocating the couple’s terminally-ill son told today how Andrew Wragg had talked about killing the youngster.

Mr Wragg is accused of placing a pillow over the face of 10-year-old Jacob at the family home in Henty Close, Worthing, West Sussex last July. The boy was suffering from a severe form of the degenerative disease Hunter Syndrome when he was killed by Wragg, who denies murder but admits manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

Fighting back tears, and holding pictures of the tragic boy, Mary Wragg told Lewes Crown Court that her husband had once said he would put a pillow over his son’s face if he was suffering too much.

The comment was made when Jacob was in hospital in Manchester, and she and Wragg, 37, were talking to the mother of another sick child.

"I was asking her about her daughter and how she was coping with caring for her. I was holding her hand," said Mrs Wragg, 41.

"The woman said she wished they would leave her daughter alone because she felt she was suffering unnecessarily and that they were keeping her alive unnecessarily. I clearly remember Andy saying that if he thought Jacob was suffering he would put a pillow over his face."

Mrs Wragg added Jacob was "happy and lively" on the day he was killed, July 24 last year. He had a good appetite and was not suffering from a cough or cold, conditions which regularly plagued the youngster.

The court heard that the couple met 16 years ago in Worthing and spent many months of their relationship apart, first when Mr Wragg was in the Merchant Navy and later after he joined the Army. When Jacob was born on November 23, 1993, his father was undergoing training to become a member of the SAS in Hereford.

The court heard how the birth was normal but that the youngster began to have monthly coughs and colds for which he was later sent for tests. Mrs Wragg was again on her own without her husband when doctors informed her that Jacob was suffering from a severe degenerative condition.

Mr Wragg took leave from the Army to join his wife as it became clear that Jacob would not live beyond his 20s and would become deaf, dumb and blind. To add to the tragedy the couple then discovered that Mrs Wragg's unborn child was also carrying the disease.

They decided to have the child aborted, but Mrs Wragg said she found it hard to discuss the situation with her husband.

"I was advised that, because of the care that Jacob would need, I should not have a second child. At seven months we decided on a termination. We called the child Henry and we were allowed to have a funeral."

She told how she later became distressed when her husband insisted to friends that they had been right to terminate the child at seven months. She said: "I did not agree. My attitude was to get on with caring for Jacob and to make the most of what we had."

She told the court that, after the abortion, their relationship began to fall apart. Mr Wragg lost his SAS badge following "an incident" in Harrogate. He was discharged from the SAS, given a year’s paid leave and told he could reapply for his position. However, the defendant left the Army altogether and took a job in Northampton.

At the same time, Mrs Wragg left the married quarters and moved to Worthing to be nearer her husband’s family. Her husband did not move with her, and she was left to undertake the burden of Jacob's care and to drive north to the Royal Manchester Hospital for frequent tests and operations.

Mrs Wragg said that her estranged husband occasionally came to Manchester but found the situation unbearable. She said: "He got very stressed out. He got very cross with the doctors and nurses if they were not doing things in a certain way.

"He just disliked hospitals and ill people, the whole thing. He chose not to come. Mostly it was me driving Jacob up and down to Manchester."

The court heard how the pair’s relationship had become almost non-existent at that stage. She said: "It was down to him as and when he felt like visiting us. I could not say I could call on him to provide childcare or financial support.

"He did take Jacob swimming sometimes but he was not very tolerant of doing family things together."

Mrs Wragg painted a poignant picture of the last day of Jacob’s life, July 24, describing a scene of normal family life. She told the court how she took Jacob and the couple’s youngest son, George, to a seaside fair in Worthing.

"He was strong and able to take into account what he did and wanted to do," said Mrs Wragg, clutching a child's dummy in her hand.

"At the fair he chose his own lunch and told me what he wanted through a mixture of lip-reading and signing. He fed himself and at one point kicked off a shoe because he was getting annoyed just looking at one stall.

"That morning he had been up and running from the kitchen to the bedroom, stealing biscuits from the biscuit barrel. He put on a video in the morning. Watching videos was one of his hobbies. After we had been to the fair he came back home, sat in his room and watched some more TV. He was active and happy, he was just Jacob."

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