by Alan McGuinness and Jenni Horn

PICTURE EXCLUSIVE

This is the first picture of strangle victim Edite Titane after her husband appeared in court charged with her murder.

Latvian national Agris Titans, 24, was remanded in custody when he appeared before Medway magistrates on Saturday.

The body of his 22-year-old wife (pictured left) was found by her younger sister in a downstairs bedroom at their home in Cecil Road, Rochester.

A large-scale police operation was launched as detectives attempted to trace Titans. He was arrested in front of Rochester Cathedral 34 hours later on Wednesday night and charged with murder on Friday evening.

Standing wide-eyed in the dock on Saturday morning, Titans was flanked by two security guards and spoke only to confirm his identity through an interpreter.

No application for bail was made and he will appear at Maidstone Crown Court tomorrow (Tuesday).

A close friend of the couple, who had been married for three years, told the Messenger he is stunned by Edite's death.

Speaking from Latvia, he said: "I am really shocked. Agris comes from a big family, he has a lot of brothers and sisters. I met them at a party three years ago in Riga. They were living there for about three years."

He said Agris (pictured right) worked in a wood factory before coming to the Towns, while Edite - also a Latvian national - stayed at home to look after their daughter.

Edite moved to Medway in April to be closer to her family. She lived in a white terraced house with Titans, her brother and sister as well as another couple and an older man. They all worked as fruit pickers in Rainham.

Her body was found when police were called to the property shortly before 10am last Monday.

A murder investigation was launched and a post mortem examination revealed Edite died from asphyxiation after compression of the neck. An inquest into her death was opened and adjourned on Thursday.

It is not known if the couple's three-year-old daughter witnessed Edite's death, but she is being cared for by Edite's mother, who also lives in Medway.

The couple spell their surnames differently for cultural reasons.