UNCONTROLLABLE jealousy over his wife's sexual affairs and flirtatious behaviour pushed hotheaded Randle Williams into a chain of violent rages, a court heard.

Neighbours accused of having affairs with Natalie, whose glamour and sense of style was compared in court to screen legend Marilyn Monroe, described how Williams lashed out at them in obsessive outbursts.

Married dentist Neil MacFarlane, who admitted having an affair with Mrs Williams while she worked for him at his Newbury practice in 1997, said the 43-year-old computer boss lodged sexual harassment allegations and angrily confronted him on several occasions at his home and work about the relationship.

Brian Anderson, who lives two doors away from the couple's £350,000 Greenland Mills home, said Williams attacked him with a trouser press while he lay naked in bed and said Williams battered Natalie until she bled because he suspected them of having an affair.

Mr Anderson told the jury how he was stunned by the ferocity of the assault in which Williams ripped a heavy trouser press off a wall and hurled it at him before punching him in the face.

The flare-up came soon after Mrs Williams joined in an unplanned party held at Mr Anderson's house in August 2000.

Williams tried on two occasions to force his wife to leave the event but drove off in a mood telling the party host he was leaving his spouse for good.

Mr Anderson described how he went to bed leaving a few partygoers to lock up but woke later to find Mrs Williams dancing at the end of his bed.

"All I remember is being awoken and the light was on. I sat up and Natalie was standing at the bottom of my bed fully clothed and seemed to be dancing. She was in a world of her own," he said.

"Within a split second the bedroom door flew open and Randle punched Natalie two to three times in the face and then picked up the trouser press which was next to me and threw it at me. It was a vicious attack and it happened so quickly."

Bleeding Natalie lay on the bed while Williams ran out of the house.

The 33-year-old cosmetics buyer later told Mr Anderson she thought he provoked the incident and point-blank refused to pay up for £1,000 damage to a carpet caused by bloodstains and a shattered trouser press.

Next door neighbour Guy Clayton said Williams struck him in the face several times when he stormed into his house in October 1999 and found him talking to Mrs Williams in his lounge.

Defence barrister Neil Ford QC said Williams' rage was ignited when he walked into the room and saw his wife on top of his neighbour in a sexual clinch.

Close friend Sylvia Wannell said Williams confided to her at a party how they were moving to Hampshire to make a "fresh start" because of Mrs Williams' affair with a neighbour.

In the build-up to the murder, Mark Evans QC said Williams believed his wife was having a sexual affair with a colleague at Bath department store Jolly's and the computer boss once told his wife's brother-in-law Michael Boyle about her interest in internet chat rooms and pornography.

The trial continues