A man who gave his estranged wife a hamburger full of rat poison and also poured petrol through her letterbox has been jailed for five years.
Hardev Singh, 37, of Maidstone Road, Rochester, Kent, had moved out of the home he shared with Sonia Boswell.
But after taking their five children to a McDonald's restaurant, he returned with a Big Mac for Ms Boswell. Police found rat poison pellets in it.
"Mercifully rat poison would not have caused any real harm," a judge said.
Your children were in this house and they could have been burnt to death
Judge Timothy Nash
Singh was given a five-year jail sentence for attempted arson, and two years to run concurrently for administering poison.
Judge Timothy Nash, sitting at Canterbury Crown Court on Friday, told him he would serve two-and-a-half years, taking into account the time already spent on remand.
It was during a contact visit four months after leaving the marital home that Singh took his children to McDonald's.
He left them in the restaurant while he went outside to his car and put the pellets in the burger.
'Little patience'
Ms Boswell said it tasted wrong when she bit into it.
The Big Mac was returned to McDonald's, and it was then seized by police after a complaint was made to trading standards.
It was two months later when Singh poured petrol through the letterbox of Ms Boswell's Maidstone home. "You may have had little patience or little time for your partner, but there were your children in this house and they could have been burnt to death," Judge Nash said.
Story from BBC NEWS:
Hardev Singh, 37, of Maidstone Road, Rochester, Kent, had moved out of the home he shared with Sonia Boswell.
But after taking their five children to a McDonald's restaurant, he returned with a Big Mac for Ms Boswell. Police found rat poison pellets in it.
"Mercifully rat poison would not have caused any real harm," a judge said.
Your children were in this house and they could have been burnt to death
Judge Timothy Nash
Singh was given a five-year jail sentence for attempted arson, and two years to run concurrently for administering poison.
Judge Timothy Nash, sitting at Canterbury Crown Court on Friday, told him he would serve two-and-a-half years, taking into account the time already spent on remand.
It was during a contact visit four months after leaving the marital home that Singh took his children to McDonald's.
He left them in the restaurant while he went outside to his car and put the pellets in the burger.
'Little patience'
Ms Boswell said it tasted wrong when she bit into it.
The Big Mac was returned to McDonald's, and it was then seized by police after a complaint was made to trading standards.
It was two months later when Singh poured petrol through the letterbox of Ms Boswell's Maidstone home. "You may have had little patience or little time for your partner, but there were your children in this house and they could have been burnt to death," Judge Nash said.
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