Kuntal Patel, 37, who was arrested in January for allegedly trying to kill her abusive mother Meena, 60, has pleaded guilty to two counts of attempting to acquire a biological agent or toxin last December. She had laced her mother's drink, Diet Coke, with a poisonous substance last year.
Patel bought the substance from a site on the 'dark web' based in the US using the virtual currency Bitcoins, using layer upon layer of encryption to try to cover her tracks. And she watched as her mother, who sits on the bench at Thames Magistrates' Court, drank the substance at her home in Stratford, East London last December, but survived.
The FBI in America launched an investigation after monitoring a website which claimed to sell poisonous substances and Kuntal, a graphic designer at Barclays Bank in Canary Wharf, was arrested this January when she acquired the deadly toxin from the website, jurors at London's Southwark Crown Court heard.
According to the prosecutor, “She was inspired, in part, by the US television series Breaking Bad”, a series 'in which someone is killed using poison'. Meena Patel was against her daughter marrying the man of her choice and 'harassed her every now and then'. Despite the regular physical and mental abuse of Kuntal's mother, the couple got engaged in November 2012 and Kuntal hatched a plan to kill her mother, jurors heard.
The trial continues.
