By Wayne Flower, Melbourne Correspondent
02:51 15 Jun 2023, updated 02:51 15 Jun 2023
- Victorian man consumed poisoned chocolate bar
- Snickers contained quantity of rat poison
- Collapsed in jail cell and broke his finger
- Man convicted of child sex offences
A man in the process of being found guilty of child sex offences has scoffed a poisonous chocolate bar while seated in the prison dock.
The elderly man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was in the process of being delivered guilty verdicts on Friday over four child sex offences when he produced the rat-poison laced Snickers bar.
He had been on trial in the Warrnambool County Court, in Victoria’s west, where he was accused of molesting his partner’s young daughter.
Crime reporter Andrew Thomson had been in the courtroom reporting for the Warrnambool Standard when he saw the man produce the chocolate bar from his pocket.
When instructed by custody staff that he could not eat in court, the man continued to finish off the Snickers bar, he reported.
‘He then told the custody staff he had poisoned himself as he had laced the chocolate bar with rat poison,’ Thomson wrote.
The man, believed to be aged in his 70s, was remanded in custody despite his declaration and later collapsed in the Warrnambool police station cells, breaking a finger.
He was taken to Warrnambool Base Hospital where he was treated for poisoning within its intensive care unit.
It is understood the amount of rat poison in the chocolate bar was not enough to kill the man.
On Wednesday, the court was told the man had received treatment and that his condition had improved enough to return him to the Warrnambool police station cells.
In an opening address, prosecutors alleged the man had abused his victim between 1991 and 2000 while the girl was aged between four and 14-years-old.
The man is expected to be moved to a remand prison until September 11 where he will face a preliminary sentence hearing.
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