Christina Plumb was handed a suspended sentence after a court heard how the war widow kicked and bit her second husband during a row at their £1.3 million eight-bedroom home
A famous war widow who once met David Cameron and the late Queen has avoided jail after drunkenly attacking and biting her husband.
Christina Plumb carried out the drunken assault on her property developer husband Adam in during a row at their £1.3 million eight-bedroom home in the village of Ugborough, Devon, last September. She kicked, scratched and bit him, and also aimed a single punch at his 18-year-old daughter during the same gin-fuelled assault.
Plumb, 49, became a public figure when she began campaigning for families of those killed in military service in the 2000s. Her first husband, army bomb disposal expert Sgt Olaf Schmid, died while trying to defuse an IED device in Afghanistan the day before he was due to return home in October 2009. She later received his posthumous George Cross from the late Queen Elizabeth II, and also met then-Prime Minister David Cameron.
She was found guilty of two counts of assault by beating last month. On Monday, District Judge Stuart Smith at Plymouth Magistrates’ Court gave her a 12-week prison sentence, suspended for 12 months. He ordered her to carry out 150 hours unpaid work, a 60 day alcohol abstinence ruling and attend 20 rehab days. He also imposed a two year restraining order and told her to pay £1,064 in costs, which include £150 compensation to Mr Plumb and £100 to his daughter.
Last month, the trial heard that the in assault September 2023 began after the pair had gone to bed. Mr Plumb said his wife had drunk most of a bottle of gin that evening, and started kicking him while he tried to sleep. He started to leave but she followed him out of the bedroom, grabbing, scratching, screaming and “just attacking me”, he said.
Footage taken on a mobile phone showed Plumb in her nightdress screaming at Mr Plumb during a confrontation in the bedroom. As the row escalated, Plumb bit him on the back.
Mr Plumb ended up in a walk-in dressing room but could not leave because she blocked his path, reported Devon Live. “When I went to leave she bit me in the middle of the back,” he said. Police were called after the incident and she was arrested.
The court was shown a photo of the wound to his back. Mr Plumb filmed some of what happened on his mobile. It showed the defendant demanding he hand over her phone and Mr Plumb saying he did not have it. It was later found next to the bed.
During sentencing on Monday, the judge told Plumb: “These are significant offences. You are a manipulative individual. You were aggressor throughout this incident.”
He said she had caused Mr Plumb and his 18-year-old daughter Ellie psychological harm and sleepless nights, and caused disruption to their lives by her “relentless spreading of lies online” in what he called a “smear campaign”. She had continued even during the trial and after she was convicted of the assaults on both her husband and his daughter.
The judge warned her to “listen to what I say”, adding that she is banned from making any contact with the victims – or posting anything online – as this could lead to further criminal charges. He told her after the trial: “Your demeanour is utterly inconsistent with somebody who has just been beaten. I did not find your evidence credible. I find you have falsely made out Mr Plumb to be the aggressor whilst all the time it was you who was the aggressor. When police did not fall for it you became hysterical.”
A victim impact statement from Adam Plumb was read out in court, in which he said Plumb had “destroyed” his life and left him homeless. He said: “She has completely destroyed my life. I have been treated like I am the abuser. She had me arrested on false allegations, she had me thrown out of my house. I was homeless and sleeping in my car.”
