Earl of Elgin's ex-wife tells of Texas jail torment

Bruce - also known as Travis County Jail Inmate No 1614050 but previously the wife of Scottish aristocrat Lord Charles Bruce, the 11th Earl of Elgin - was jailed last December after admitting four charges of fraud, and was due to serve a 15-month sentence.

However, she was released earlier this month and has now told of the violence she encountered during her spell behind bars.

The earl's former wife, 42, described how she had to be placed in protective custody after she was stabbed in the back with a pencil by a drug addict. The wound became badly infected and led to her spending nine days in hospital. "It was awful, horrible" she said. "There is now a red hole in my back."

She claims her attacker had been high on drugs and was provoked by the belief that Bruce had skipped the queue to use the telephone.

Bruce said her background also made her stand out as a target of attack. "You don't get people like me in jail. These people have nothing. I was so out of place."

She told how, on a separate occasion, a fellow inmate had threatened to cut her "ear to ear" and claimed that the guards had done nothing to combat such abuse.

Bruce said she hopes to use her experiences to set up a charity to help fellow convicts when they are released, adding that her time in jail had made her a better person. She said: "I know that one day I'm going to look back on this and be glad I had the experience. It will make me a socially responsible person."

She is now believed to be staying with friends in Texas. But the mother of three has showed no signs of remorse or regret for the frauds in her native US which prompted her arrest.

"I'm still recovering from the fallout of this thing but I wouldn't change it," she said.