Robbers ‘held Rambo knife to Mark Cavendish’s throat’ during raid, court hears

The Olympic cyclist Mark Cavendish has told of the moment armed robbers threatened him with a "large" rambo knife in front of his wife as his three-year-old child hid under the covers.

Cavendish, 37, told a court how he was punched by intruders at his home in Ongar, Essex, before one of the balaclava-clad attackers brandished a blade during the raid his wife described as "everybody's worst nightmare".

Romario Henry, 31, and Oludewa Okorosobo, 28, both from London, are on trial at Chelmsford Crown Court accused of the robbery in the early hours of November 27, 2021. Two suspects remain at large and Ali Sesay, 28, from east London, has pleaded guilty to robbery.

The court has heard how four masked men made off with two Richard Mille watches, worth a total of £700,000, a Louis Vuitton suitcase and a safe from his home during the raid at 2.30am which has been described by prosecutors as a "well-orchestrated and well-executed planned invasion".

Mr Cavendish's watch was one of only four or five ever made and his wife's diamond encrusted timepiece was one of a kind. However, it has been suggested by Archangelo Power, representing Henry, that the intruders may have been looking for a blue sapphire watch which had been loaned to her husband by Richard Mille to wear at the GQ Awards where he was pictured on the red carpet.

Cavendish, who has a silver medal from the Rio 2016 Olympics and has won 34 Tour de France stages, was in bed with his wife when the gang smashed into their home, and giving evidence on Monday said he had only just recovered from a crash which put him in intensive care when he was attacked.

Wearing a blue jumper and white-collared shirt, Cavendish said they were woken by a noise downstairs and his wife got up to investigate.

"I got up to follow her out and as I was stepping out of the room is when she started to come back up," he said. "She shouted 'get in'. There were figures really close behind her."

He said he had tried to press a panic alarm but he could not find it in the darkness and was jumped on by an intruder who started to punch him in the head.

"I went to press for the panic alarm and as it was still dark I had to feel for it and it was too late and I was jumped on by one man," he said. "Straight away he was punching me in the head. One had me, and another pulled out a knife and held it to my face.

"It wasn't a knife you have in a kitchen. It was black and had holes in it. It was a weapon. They were asking where the watches and safe were. Later on they were asking where the cash and jewellery."

Cavendish, who said he was naked when he was attacked, told how he pointed towards his watch on the window sill after trying in vain to open a safe but it was out of battery. He later heard the "screeching of tyres" as the gang fled, having forced him to open the front gates.

Mrs Cavendish had earlier held back tears as told the court the raid was "everyone's worst nightmare" and after waking in the early hours she had expected to find one of the children downstairs but instead saw "men's figures in balaclavas and they were running towards the stairs".

"It's everyone's worst nightmare, it wasn't what I thought I was going down to," she said. "I didn't think in anyone's realm of possibility that I thought that's what you're going down to. It was so sudden that I didn't have time to think about how you're going to react to something. I just knew that all my babies were asleep in the house. I tried to run up the stairs as quickly as I could."

Mrs Cavendish said that men were wearing balaclavas, tracksuits and gloves then went for her husband and demanded valuables.

"Straight away they said 'where are the watches, where is the safe'. To Mark straight away, they dragged him from his feet and started punching him. One of them then had him in a headlock," she said.

"One of them then held a large black knife to his throat, they said where is the watches and do you want me to stab you up in front of your kid."

Asked to describe the blade she said it was serrated and around a foot long and agreed with Edward Renvoize, prosecuting, that it could be described as a "rambo knife"

"I'm pretty sure one of them kneed him to the head at one point and continued to punch him, he was on the floor, he wasn't left alone," she continued. "They were very specific about a watch, we tried to explain we'd been broken into a couple of years previously and everything had been taken."

Both men deny two counts of robbery and the trial continues.