Bulgarian NHS doctor killed his partner’s father with poison and nearly killed her and her mother, High Court judge rules, after he put highly toxic thallium in his family’s coffee
- The medic poisoned all three while on holiday in Bulgaria, the court was told
- He hasn’t been named to protect the identity of children involved in the case
- Ruling made at the end of family court hearing in which he applied to see son
A Bulgarian NHS doctor killed his partner’s father with poison and nearly killed her and her mother after putting a highly toxic substance in his family’s coffee, a High Court judge has ruled.
Mr Justice Williams handed down the ruling at the end of a family court hearing in which the medic had applied for an order allowing him to see his son.
It emerged during this case that the man poisoned his partner and her parents with thallium, after the boy’s mother used it as grounds to oppose the contact order, the Times reports.
The doctor, who hasn’t been named to protect the identity of children involved in the case, never faced charges from police either here or in Bulgaria over the poisoning, which he still denies, and therefore hasn’t faced a criminal prosecution.
Such a ruling being made in a family court was unusual as the conclusion was drawn on the balance of all probabilities of the evidence, rather than ‘beyond all reasonable doubt’, which is what a jury has to ensure in the criminal court.
A Bulgarian NHS doctor killed his partner’s father with poison and nearly killed her and her mother after putting a highly toxic substance in his family’s coffee, the High Court has ruled
Dubbed the ‘poisoner’s poison’, Thallium is highly toxic but is tasteless, colourless and odourless and any contact with skin is dangerous.
Thallium, once known as ‘Inheritance Powder’ because it could easily kill people, is typically found in electronics and was used by Saddam Hussein on dissidents.
It is slow-acting and painful and symptoms include vomiting, diarrhea and hair loss.
The court found the doctor added thallium to a pot of coffee when he was on holiday in his native country with his then-partner, her parents, and his then one-year-old child in 2012.
He drank instant coffee while the three other adults drank from the pot.
The latter died but the two women, found to have similar levels of thallium in their blood, survived.
The court was told the poison may have been sourced through the doctor’s work or over the internet and was most likely ingested orally.
It was alleged that his ‘primary aim’ was to kill the grandparents, but he ‘vigorously disputed’ evidence that he’d poisoned their coffee.
When he saw his partner also drink a cup, he did not prevent her, the court was told.
When the family eventually returned to the UK, the doctor tried to cover his tracks by saying the grandfather’s death was recorded as a stroke and that poisoning had not been diagnosed after the mother was treated by various hospitals.
But Mr Justice Williams said on the civil standard of proof that the ‘mother has proved that it is more likely than not that the father was responsible for the introduction of thallium into the coffees’.
He added that the father failed to assist in the treatment of all three and tried to divert attention from both himself and thallium poisoning as the reason for their illness.
In conclusion, he said: ‘Why the father did this I have no idea. Only he can know.’
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