'Insane' Solicitor Injected His Blood into Food
Crystal meth user Leoaai Elghareeb caused supermarkets £500,000 of losses
CCTV showing Leoaai Elghareeb injecting food in Sainsbury's
A court has heard details of how a local solicitor injected his own blood into food products at three supermarkets in Fulham.
37-year-old Leoaai Elghareeb of Crabtree Lane walked down Fulham Palace Road at 7.30pm on 25 August last year and walked into Waitrose, Sainsbury’s and Tesco sticking a syringe into food products. Much of the stock of the stores needed to be destroyed resulting in over half a million pounds’ worth of damage for the three companies.
At his trial at Isleworth Crown Court he was also accused of assaulting two people including a doctor who he threw a syringe at and a Sainsbury's security guard.
Witnesses told how they saw Mr Elghareeb walking along the road with a small bucket full of syringes some of which had needles attached. As he progressed he was shouting and throwing some of the needles at people passing by including Dr Meghana Kulkarni.
A number of the syringes were filled with his blood and he entered the supermarkets to deliberately contaminate their food including fresh fruit and ready meals. He assaulted one of the Sainsbury’s security staff, Bilal Ansari, who challenged him after he had been verbally abusive to a female customer and thrown an egg. He then shouted “You are all vile people and Sainsbury’s is vile.”
A customer brought a cooked chicken with a syringe sticking out of it to Mr Ansari which was when he realised the full extent of what he had been doing.
After he left Sainsbury’s he proceeded north up Fulham Palace Road, throwing a plant pot through the open door of the Avanti Tapas Bar before being arrested outside The Distillers Pub.
As part of the clean up process by the three supermarkets, 21 syringes were recovered.
A police cordon outside Tesco Express on Fulham Palace Road. Picture: H&F Council
Mr Elghareeb denied the charges against him, admitting to having carried out the acts but using the defence that he was insane at the time. His defence told the court that he was a crystal meth user and that he had believed that there was an implant in his brain that MI5 were using to monitor him.
Mr Elghareeb, ran his own legal consultancy firm and was described by his legal representative as being of previous good character. He had worked for some top legal firms receiving his training at Herbert Smith Freehills before spending much of his career working in the Middle east for Allen & Overy.
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March 7, 2022