Ryan Wellings, the violent ‘monster’ whose fiancée claimed before she died had driven her to suicide, has proposed to his new girlfriend from jail, MailOnline can reveal.
After years of sickening abuse from her partner, Kiena Dawes, 23, wrote a suicide note saying, ‘Ryan Wellings killed me’, before leaving their nine-month-old daughter with a friend and taking her own life on a railway line on July 22, 2022.
Earlier this month Wellings, 30, was jailed for six and a half years after being cleared of manslaughter but convicted of assault and coercive control, and blew kisses from the dock to new girlfriend Emma Croft, 28.
Wellings was described by the prosecution as an ‘entitled, aggressive bully’ and by Kiena’s friends as a ‘horrible little b*****d’ with a jealous streak who did not like being answered back to.
Now friends of Emma Croft have revealed how he proposed to her in a letter he left with his mother Lisa Green before the jury’s verdict.
As Wellings was convicted and jailed it emerged that police were investigating allegations heard by the court that Croft and his mother, Lisa Green, had ‘coached’ him for his testimony at Preston Crown Court.
Following the trial, Croft agreed to ‘step down’ from her job at a Beauty Salon in Blackpool after the owner found the controversy surrounding her alleged involvement in the case was harming business.
Now she has stunned friends by telling them she will ‘stick by’ Wellings and has accepted his ‘proposal’, vowing to wait for him until his release.
One friend told MailOnline: ‘She keeps telling everyone they don’t really know the real Ryan, but she’s in complete denial.
‘The idea that she would even consider walking down the aisle with someone like him, having heard what was said in court, is quite incredible.’
Another former friend of Croft’s has told MailOnline that she was ‘completely in thrall’ to Wellings and ‘in denial’ about the nature of his personality.
‘She’s got this fairytale view of him, but it’s caused so much bad feeling in Blackpool,’ said the friend.
‘The owner of the salon where she worked has had enough of the bad publicity and threatening messages, so she asked Emma to step down and she agreed.’
In a Facebook post, The Powder Room salon announced earlier this month: ‘Please Read. In regards to recent media coverage, we would like to inform our client that Emma Croft no longer works at The Powder Room.
‘We ask that others are kind and respectful towards all staff who work hard to make our salon an inviting place and have nothing to do with the situation that has arisen.
‘Police are aware of recent media comments and are staying in close contact with the owners of the salon. Thank you.’
Jurors heard how Wellings repeatedly lashed out at hairdresser Kiena, beating her while she was pregnant with his child, as well as threatening to drown her in a bath, drill her teeth and ‘make her look like Katie Piper’ by dousing her with acid.
He also urged Ms Dawes to kill herself, boasted that ‘hitting you is like hitting a man’ and, on one occasion, forced her head underwater in a bath and said: ‘Say goodbye to your baby’.
He was the first defendant to be tried before a jury accused of the unlawful killing of his partner after her suicide following domestic violence, but was found not guilty.
He turned and blew a kiss to Croft as the verdict was read out, while Ms Dawes’s sister burst into tears.
Despite being cleared of manslaughter, Wellings was convicted of assault and coercive control for two years of violence and abuse.
In one incident just 11 days before Ms Dawes’s death, on July 11, 2022 he ‘launched’ her into a radiator with such force it broke the appliance off the wall, then slammed a door in her face – knocking her out and leaving her with blood pouring from her head.
She called police at least five times reporting domestic problems with Wellings. While she frequently downplayed her abuse to officers – due to threats from her partner – she did make a statement about the assault on July 11.
He was arrested for assault but bailed on condition he did not contact her, which he did.
Ms Dawes wrote in a suicide note: ‘I was murdered. Ryan Wellings killed me. He ruined every bit of strength I had left. I had dreams. I had a future at one point. That was taken away from me.’
In the note, she also shared her hopes that police would act ‘faster’ in cases like hers and three police officers are now facing disciplinary proceedings.
The prosecution claimed that Wellings took advantage of Ms Dawes’s vulnerability – on account of issues with her mental health – and was repeatedly violent and abusive towards her.
He also sponged off her, unable to hold down work, securing and leaving 22 jobs and draining her of money while she worked two jobs. Wellings claimed £15,000 in Covid loans during lockdown which he spent on hotels, £1,800 golf clubs and drugs.
This abuse was a ‘significant factor’ in her decision to take her own life, prosecutors said. She was later found dead on railway tracks, near Garstang, Lancashire, after being hit by a train.
Wellings’s defence team insisted the injuries Ms Dawes had suffered before her death had been as a result of his attempts to restrain her or had been inflicted accidentally.
They suggested that descriptions of the landscape gardener’s behaviours by her had been either inaccurate, untrue or exaggerated.
And they claimed that despite the young mother’s relationship with her partner being a ‘recipe for disaster’ – Wellings was not guilty of driving her to suicide through domestic violence.
Defence counsel John Jones KC told Preston Crown Court Ms Dawes’s suicide was not caused ‘in any significant degree’ by his client.
He added the couple’s ‘party lifestyle’ had been a ‘recipe for disaster’ and their ‘fairytale’ relationship was to end in turmoil because of Wellings’s temper, Ms Dawes’s mental health difficulties, and their joint abuse of cocaine.
Kiena had been diagnosed with an emotionally unstable personality disorder resulting in increased impulsivity, poor self-esteem and difficulty in relationships, a condition that the court heard was exploited by Wellings.
After the case, Harriet Wistrich, Director of the Centre for Women’s Justice, said: ‘Coercive control is a bespoke form of abuse which targets a victim’s vulnerabilities.
‘In this case there seems to have been evidence of “gaslighting” whereby Wellings used Kiena’s past mental health to push her to the edge. Jurors need help in understanding how a victim can become so entrapped in an abusive relationship that they can see no way out.
‘Many victims of domestic abuse who take their own lives will have pre-existing vulnerabilities, which are deliberately exploited by their abuser to exert control and inflict harm. The justice system must hold perpetrators accountable for the full scope of their actions.’
MailOnline approached Wellings’s mother Lisa Green but she denied that her son was engaged to Emma Croft.
