Leoaai Elghareeb, who is pleading not guilty by reason of insanity, allegedly walked down a street in West London carrying a black bucket of syringes, some of which had needles attached, throwing them at people outside and inside several supermarkets, the Independent reported.
The 37-year-old is also alleged to have thrown a syringe of blood at the chest of a doctor in the street during what the newspaper called an “alleged rampage” on the evening of August 25, 2021.
Jurors at the trial were shown CCTV footage of Elghareeb injecting syringes into products like apples, chicken fillets, and TV dinners in three supermarkets. In one he also threw eggs, swore at staff and customers, and is accused of pushing a security guard.
Consultant forensic psychiatrist Dr. Bradley Hillier told the court that Elghareeb was “severely psychotic” at the time of the rampage and could not appreciate that his actions were “legally and morally wrong,” the Mirror reported.
He told the court: “He was not thinking straight … He was so burdened and tortured, is the [wording] he used.”
Elghareeb was detained and arrested outside a pub shortly after throwing a plant pot through the open doors of a restaurant, narrowly missing a waiter. Upon his arrest, the court heard that 21 syringes of blood had been recovered. Some had hypodermic needles attached and some were filled with Elghareeb’s blood.
The three stores involved were forced to throw away food totaling almost £500,000 and could only reopen days later.
Prosecutor Philip Stott told the court of Elghareeb’s actions in one store that lost £207,000 ($281,000) in produce: “He then went into a branch of Little Waitrose … He began to throw syringes and also to stick them into the packets of food there.
“Once staff realized what had happened, they told everyone to drop their shopping and leave, and then closed the store.”
Stott continued: “A number of syringes filled with blood were recovered from the branch, some of which were found on the floor, and some of [which] were sticking into packets of food, for example, apples and a packet of chicken tikka fillets.”
Healthline says that the most pressing danger of consuming blood is a condition called hemochromatosis, the effect that its iron content has on the liver, but this is unlikely to be a concern in small amounts such as that alleged to have been injected into food by Elghareeb.
But Labmate adds that even the ingestion of small amounts of blood carries with it the risk of spreading disease. The site says that Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C, and HIV are all diseases that could possibly be contracted through ingesting infected blood.
Elghareeb faces three counts of contaminating food with the intent to cause the public alarm, anxiety, or injury and two counts of assault by beating.
