Wife killed on prison visit

A CONVICTED killer has appeared in a Canadian court charged with the murder of a British millionairess who married him after a pen friendship turned to romance.

Patricia Scott, an antiques dealer from Blackheath, south- east London, flew to Canada to marry Greg Williams, who was serving a life sentence in a top- security institution near Vancouver for murdering a 24- year-old mother of three.

But just over a year later, police claim she has become his latest victim. She was killed on 12 November in a mobile home in the grounds of the Kent Institution in Agassiz, near Vancouver, where inmates were allowed conjugal visits. Police say Williams poisoned her with heroin to inherit her fortune of about pounds 1.5m.

Williams, 31, appeared in court in British Columbia on Tuesday charged with first-degree murder. The case was adjourned until 29 November.

The story began three years ago when Patricia Scott replied to Williams's advertisement for penfriends. She knew that he was serving a life sentence for the murder of a woman during a sex attack. But she told family and friends that he was a reformed character.

Canadian police say that Williams poisoned her to inherit her money, then took a heroin overdose, later maintaining that he had tried to kill himself as part of a suicide pact they had made.

Mrs Williams's family had been concerned by the marriage. Her brother, Tom Scott, 47, who flew to Canada from London after his sister's death, said: 'Now the worst has happened I want some answers.'