Shropshire Star

Telford man poisoned wife's food with laxatives for THREE YEARS

A Telford man poisoned his new wife by giving her laxatives over a three-year period. David Thomas Smith has admitted poisoning his wife Elizabeth.

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In an interview today his wife spoke of her life with him, revealing he claimed to be one of the SAS special forces heroes who raided the Iranian embassy in 1980.

She also said Smith claimed to have cancer after his crime was discovered.

Smith claimed he had cancer

The poisoning made Elizabeth so ill that her friends and family thought was she was dying from a terminal illness.

A court heard 63-year-old Smith, from Wharf Close in St Georges, slipped the laxatives into food he prepared for Elizabeth, leaving her so thin and weak she could hardly stand.

He is now facing jail after admitting poisoning his wife at court earlier this week.

Smith admitted culpably and recklessly administering laxatives to Elizabeth between March 1, 2012, and July 20, 2015, knowing that they would damage her health so that she "repeatedly suffered illness or injury and required medical treatment", when he appeared at Ayr Sheriff Court, Scotland.

Beauty therapist Elizabeth, 62, from Ayr, today said she wanted everyone to know that Smith was a dangerous liar.

She said: "It has been an utter nightmare. I feel like I've been through hell. My health was so bad that people thought I was dying. I was shaking and could not eat. If I tried to walk, I would get dizzy and fall over. The diarrhoea and vomiting was horrendous.

"I am convinced that whatever he was spiking me with was more potent than just laxatives. At one point, I was showing signs of multiple sclerosis, my symptoms were that bad."

Elizabeth said that, when they first met, Smith falsely claimed he owned a factory that made top secret components for the MoD which he was due to sell in a multi-million pound deal. He said his first wife was a professional ballerina who died in a car crash – which was also a lie.

After a whirlwind romance in 2012, the pair married in 2015.

But he had been secretly poisoning her for the three years they were together.

Elizabeth became so gaunt and unwell, her family thought she was dying.

On one occasion, she passed out in the bathroom and woke up covered in diarrhoea and vomit, with father-of-three Smith hovering over in a panic.

She said: "He told me so many lies. He is twisted and dangerous. Not long after I met him in Ayr, he told me he was one of the guys that carried out the SAS raid on the Iranian embassy.

"He said he was in the SAS and got up to all sorts.

"I loved him so I never thought he would lie to me. I feel as if my heart has been ripped out and stamped on by a man who I once loved."

The pair met when Elizabeth was out clothes shopping in 2012. They exchanged phone numbers and their relationship began.

Elizabeth said her suspicions about him were raised when the bank notified her that thousands were flowing out of her account at £350 at a time – the maximum that could be withdrawn from a cash machine.

She recorded Smith confessing to poisoning her. He then claimed to have cancer and sent her pictures of him with a tube up his nose.

Smith, who was unavailable for comment, is due back in court next month.

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