The widow, the money
and the poisoned curry
The news item caused a bit of a snigger among the drinkers watching TV in the pub: Britain's first safe house for battered men would open in secret in the New Year. The consensus view was clear: Any guy who let himself be bashed up by his own missus must be some kind of cissy.
Except that at least one in every six incidents of domestic violence is committed by a woman on a man, so there must be a lot more weaklings walking round out there than anyone would suspect.
Actually, the figure is almost certainly higher because many men fail to report batterings for the very reason that they will be seen as softies by their mates and family members.
Ian Hancock, a National Health Service psychologist, said: "People have this image of muscular women and weedy men but size has got nothing to do with it. A man can be twice the size of his female partner and still be battered by her."
Another thing: The violence does not have to be physical. David Smith, 46, who has three small children, said he had been emotionally abused by his wife since they married six years ago.
"People see her in public and they think she's wonderful, but they don't see the private side of her," Smith said. "At home, she loses her temper a lot and uses foul language in front of the children. Sometimes she hits me but I'm stronger than her so that's not a problem.
"But you cannot stop her when she gets started and I have to leave the house and take the children with me. We are still living together but I'm losing hope."
Whatever the shortcomings of the sharp-tongued Mrs Smith, they pale by comparison with the wicked Dena Thompson, 43, nicknamed the Black Widow after the poisonous spider which eats her partner after mating.
Dena Thompson's activities were set out at the Old Baily court in London where she was charged with murder and described by a police officer as "every man's nightmare".
Thompson married Lee Wyatt in 1984 and promised him a life of luxury in Florida. Later she conned him into thinking the mafia were after him and told him to disappear. He waited in vain for her for three years and ended up living as a tramp.
Husband number two was Julian Webb, a newspaper advertising rep. He died suddenly in 1994 on his 31st birthday, apparently a suicide, and Thompson immediately went to his employer to claim �36,000 in death benefits.
During her marriage to Webb, Thompson stole �23,000 from the Woolwich building society, where she worked, and tried to blame her first husband, Lee Wyatt. The judge rejected her claim and jailed her for 18 months.
The voracious widow met her third husband, Richard Thompson, in 1998 through a lonely hearts club. Within a year, she had conned him and two other men out of �10,000 and she was jailed for three years and nine months. At the same time, she was cleared of trying to kill her husband with a knife and baseball bat, saying she attacked him out of fear for her life during a sex session.
The deadly widow was finally brought to justice through the determination and persistence of another woman � Rosemary Webb � mother of Julian Webb, Thompson's second husband.
Mrs Webb, a teacher, had never believed that her son committed suicide or had suddenly fallen ill. She was enraged by Thompson seeking his death benefits so swiftly and she discovered that Thompson was still married to Wyatt when she married her son. She thus had committed bigamy, was not Julian Webb's next-of-kin and had no claim on his benefits.
Mrs Webb resisted Thompson's attempts to have Julian cremated and he was buried instead.
What persuaded the police to reopen investigations into Julian Webb's death was a chance remark by a witness that his wife made him a curry on his 31st birthday, the day he died.
The body was exhumed and forensic scientists concluded that Thompson had introduced anti-depressant drugs into a strong curry and given Webb a drink laced with aspirin. It was enough to kill him.
The judge told Thompson: "What you did was utterly ruthless and without pity. Nothing can excuse the wickedness of what you did." He sentenced her to life in prison.
Detective Chief Inspector Martyn Underhill said: "This woman is every man's nightmare. For a decade she has targeted men sexually, financially and physically. They can sleep safe tonight knowing she has been taken off the streets."
The implacable Mrs Webb, the bereaved mother, told police she was suspicious from the start, when her son got married after a whirlwind romance. She was stunned by his wife's lack of reaction at his death and deeply angered by her haste in seeking his death benefits. (The �36,000 was actually awarded to Mrs Webb and she gave it to charity).
Female readers should not take this column as a criticism of the tribe of Eve. It took a woman of steely purpose and implacable will to ensure a killer was brought to justice. So what's all this talk about the weaker sex?
I am sure the rest of this newspaper will be filled to overflowing with Christmas goodwill so, as an antidote to over-sweetness, here's another joke about politicians.
A doctor, a lawyer and a politician all claim that theirs is the oldest profession (forget about that other oldest profession).
The doctor insists his is the oldest because "a doctor took a rib out of Adam to make Eve".
"Not so," says the legal eagle, "a lawyer created order out of the chaos that existed before Adam."
As ever, the politician has the last word: "Ours is the oldest profession because we created the chaos."
Season's greetings, anyway.
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