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Anaesthetist who injected partner with drugs during ‘exorcisms’ jailed

A hospital anaesthetist who injected his partner with drugs during a series of exorcism ceremonies, leaving her close to death with multiple organ failure, has been jailed for 14-and-a-half years.

Hossam Metwally, 61, made dozens of video recordings of himself administering fluids through a cannula to Kelly Wilson while chanting as part of a “dangerous perversion” of the Islamic Ruqya ritual.

Ms Wilson was found at Metwally’s home in Grimsby, North East Lincolnshire, on July 4 2019 in a deep coma, on the brink of a cardiac arrest and with a fluid line inserted in her chest after engaging in an exorcism ritual the previous evening.

Metwally, who worked at the Diana Princess of Wales Hospital in the town and also ran a pain clinic from his home, denied injecting anaesthetics into Ms Wilson during an eight-week trial at Sheffield Crown Court but admitted further counts of voyeurism against two female patients following his conviction.

The court heard on Monday that he took pictures and moving footage of the women, without their knowledge and in a state of undress, when they attended his clinic for treatment.

He also altered some of the images to make them appear indecent and erotic.

Judge Jeremy Richardson QC, the Recorder of Sheffield, said: “You are a disgrace to your profession. You will not be a doctor for very much longer. I trust you will never, ever be a doctor again.

“You perverted medical practice for your own ends.

“You are also not a very good doctor because, in these perverted practices, you very nearly killed the woman you said you loved.”

Metwally qualified as a doctor in Egypt and worked in Saudi Arabia before coming to the UK in 1996 and Grimsby in 1999.

He met Ms Wilson, now 33, in about 2013 when she was a student nurse. The jury heard she had a history of depression and her health deteriorated so she stopped working as a nurse.

Metwally had a “vast stock of drugs” at his Laceby Road home, including ampoules of ketamine, propofol, fentanyl and Diazemuls.

The trial heard that he “fed” Ms Wilson’s drug addiction and administered potentially lethal anaesthetic drugs to perform Muslim exorcism rituals known as Ruqya – a valid practice that an imam told the court would never involve drugs or sedation.

Judge Richardson described Metwally as a “religious fanatic” and said the rituals he carried out on Ms Wilson were “sham religious acts”.

He said: “It may be the case that, in some perverted way, you believed you were assisting the woman you profess to love, but you went about that in a bizarre way by botched medical procedures and the administration of potent drugs which regularly endangered her life and, on at least one occasion, nearly killed her.

“This was all done under the guise of a religious practice. It was entirely bogus. What you did had nothing whatever to do with legitimate Islamic religious ritual.”

Extracts from 200 clips recorded by Metwally over four years were shown to the jury.

They included footage of Ms Wilson strapped to a bed, in a bath and of a white liquid being administered – on occasions using an electronic device.

In one clip from 2016, Metwally can be heard chanting and after he revives his partner with smelling salts, she asks “have you raped me?” and requests the police.

Judge Richardson told Metwally: “Your conduct was deliberate, persistent and repeated. It was extremely dangerous to do as you did.

“You were a doctor at the time and misusing your medical skills, such as they were, in a perverted and illegitimate manner.

“Furthermore, you were in an abusive relationship with a vulnerable woman who was infatuated with you.

“You exploited her vulnerability and exposed her to a great physical danger.”

Judge Richardson said Metwally had displayed “not a shred of remorse” and “exhibited large amounts of arrogance” during the trial.

He described the case as “both very serious and utterly bizarre” and said he had never been involved in a trial like it during his 41-year legal career.

Detective Chief Inspector Rhodri Troake, of Humberside Police, said: “The offences Dr Metwally committed were extremely serious and an abuse of his position and the trust his victims had in him.

“He is now exactly where he belongs, in prison.”

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