Sydney GP murdered his wife with deliberate insulin overdose, court hears.

By Lucy Carter

A Sydney GP accused of murdering his wife researched insulin overdoses online the day before he allegedly killed her, the Supreme Court has heard.

Dr Brian Crickitt is standing trial for the murder of his wife Christine over New Years Eve 2009, and is accused of deliberately injecting her with a fatal dose of insulin at their Woodbine home, in Sydney’s south-west.

Crown Prosecutor Mark Tedeschi QC told the court that Crickitt and his wife of 19 years were in a “toxic” relationship, and Crickitt was having an affair with another woman.

“The Crown case is that at the time of the deceased’s death, the accused and Linda Livermore were planning their future lives together,” he said.

Mr Tedeschi said Crickitt was motivated to murder his wife so he could marry Ms Livermore, claim more than half-a-million dollars from his wife’s life insurance and retain their shared property interests.

He alleged the Sydney doctor searched on Google for ‘intentional insulin overdose’ and information about symptoms the day before he murdered his spouse.

Mr Tedeschi told the opening of the judge-only trial the 63-year-old then wrote a prescription for fast-acting insulin under another patient’s name and filled it himself at a Campbelltown pharmacy on December 31, 2009.

He said Crickitt told police that he spent the night in a local park after a quarrel with his wife, but suggested Crickitt had instead been with his lover after forcibly injecting his wife with insulin.

He said the 63-year-old later took his mistress to the morgue where he viewed his wife’s body.

Autopsy found no clear cause of death: Court

Mr Tedeschi QC said Crickett knew insulin degrades quickly in a body, and that the corpse would show no traces of it 24 hours later.

“The Crown alleges that the accused devised a means of murdering his wife by using his medical knowledge and his skills as a doctor to evade detection,” he said.

Mr Tedeschi told Justice Clifton Hoeben the 63-year-old “deliberately chose New Years Eve knowing it was highly unlikely an autopsy would be done on New Years Day”.

An autopsy on Mrs Crickitt’s body on January 2, 2010 found no clear cause of death.

Defence barrister Tim Gartelmann SC disputes that insulin was a cause or even a factor in Mrs Crickitts’ death.

“The defence case ultimately will be that the cause of death remains unresolved,’ he said.

This post originally appeared on ABC News.

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