This is the moment a GP accused of trying to murder his mum’s partner with poison through a fake Covid jab checks himself into a hotel before heading to her home disguised as a nurse to inject him, a court heard.
Thomas Kwan, 53, a respected GP at a practice in Sunderland, denies attempting to murder Patrick O’Hara, then aged 71, at his mum’s home in Newcastle on January 22. He also denies an alternative charge of GBH.
Kwan has pleaded guilty to administering a noxious substance but the prosecutors say he meant to kill Mr O’Hara, his mum’s partner of more than 20 years.
Read more: North East GP 'planned to kill his mum's partner with fake Covid booster jab'
A trial, which is underway at Newcastle Crown Court, heard his mum Jenny Leung had named Mr O’Hara in her will causing a strained relationship with her son.
Kwan, who is married with a son and lived 50 miles south in Brading Court, Ingleby Barwick, faked a letter from the NHS on his home computer to Mr O’Hara “with chilling authenticity”, prosecutor Mr Peter Makepeace KC said.
Jurors watched footage of the GP checking in at a Newcastle City Centre Premier Inn, where they were told he used a fake name, before going to his mum’s house on St Thomas Street in a long coat, flat cap, surgical gloves and wearing a medical mask and tinted glasses.
His disguise even fooled his own mother, the court was told.
It heard that posing as a nurse, Kwan spent 45 minutes at the house, carrying out thorough medical tests on Mr O’Hara and even checked his unsuspecting mother’s blood pressure when she asked him to.
Kwan, in what the court heard was broken English with an Asian accent, told Mr O’Hara he needed a Covid booster, even though he had only had one three months ago.
Mr Makepeace continued: “On any view that man (Mr O’Hara) had done absolutely nothing to offend Mr Kwan in any way whatsoever.
“He was however a potential impediment to Mr Kwan inheriting his mother’s estate upon her death.
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“Mr Kwan used his encyclopaedic knowledge of, and research into, poisons to carry out his plan.
“That plan was to disguise himself as a community nurse, attend Mr O’Hara’s address, the home he shared with the defendant’s mother, and inject him with a dangerous poison under the pretext of administering a Covid booster injection.”
The trial continues.
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