Hard Luck Mr Scott, The Romance May Dead But Your Wife Isn’t!

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

Yesterday the subject of my blog post was a rather nice story about a farmer in England who had put a lot of thought, time and effort into creating a memorial tribute to his late wife. I called it “Well done Winston Howes, Who Says Romance Is Dead?”.

A bit out of character for this blog perhaps, but I admire people who do things that are just that little bit above and beyond the call of duty.

Today, however, you could say that “normal service” has been resumed. You could probably tell from the title, “Hard Luck Mr Scott, The Romance May Dead But Your Wife Isn’t!“.

This is a story about another Englishman. This time a Mr Peter Scott from Southsea who has gone down in history as the least successful husband at trying to murder his wife!

All in all Mr Scott made seven attempts to kill his wife.

And the strangest thing of all was that she never once noticed that anything was wrong.

It all started in 1980 when he took out an insurance policy on his good lady that would pay out a quarter of a million British pounds in the event of her accidental death.

Shortly afterward, he made his first attempt to cash in when he placed a lethal dose of mercury in her strawberry flan. Unfortunately for Mr Scott the heavy mercury all rolled out.

Strike attempt # 1.

However, not wishing to waste this deadly substance, he next stuffed a mackerel with the entire contents of the bottle. This time, to his delight, his wife ate it, but, to his dismay, with no side effects whatsoever.

Strike attempt # 2.

Warming to the task, he then took his better half on holiday to Yugoslavia. Recommending the panoramic views, he invited her to sit on the edge of a cliff, but she declined to do so, prompted by what she later described as some "sixth sense."  

Strike attempt # 3.

He tried the same type of thing a few weeks later when he urged her to enjoy the view from Beachy Head, the famous 500 feet high chalk headland in the south of England.

Strike attempt # 4.

Then, when his spouse was in bed with chicken-pox he started a fire outside her bedroom door, but some interfering busybody put it out.

Strike attempt # 5.

Undeterred, Mr Scott started another fire but only succeeded in burning down the entire apartment. The target of his arsonist adventures escaped uninjured.

Strike attempt # 6.

On yet another occasion he asked her to stand in the middle of the road so that he could drive toward her and check if his brakes were working.

Strike attempt # 7.

Unbelievably, at no time did Mrs. Scott feel that the magic had gone out of their marriage. She must have been sooooo dumb!

Finally, since it appeared that nothing short of a small nuclear bomb would have alerted this good woman to her husband's intentions, he eventually gave up and confessed everything to the police.

After the case, a detective said Mrs. Scott had been "absolutely shattered" when told of her husband's plot to kill her.