'I'm not right' - then alleged murder victim was dead the next day

AN ALLEGED murder victim told a friend: "I'm not right. There's definitely something wrong with me," the day before she died, a court heard.

Lesley Roberts, 46, was giving evidence at the trial of Malcolm Webster, 51, who denies murdering his first wife Claire by drugging her with Temazepam, crashing his car on the Auchenhuive to Tarves Road, Kingoodie, Aberdeenshire on 27 or 28 May 1994, and setting it on fire.

Miss Roberts, who lived near the Websters in Tarves, told advocate depute Derek Ogg QC that she became good friends with Claire in the six months before she died.

On 26 May, 1994, the two women went to a keep-fit class in Tarves and afterwards spoke for about 20 minutes before parting company.

Miss Roberts told the court: "She said she was tired and her hair was dry. She said: " 'I'm tired and I can't concentrate'.

"She said: "I'm not right. There's definitely something wrong with me."

The court has already heard that she had gone to her GP complaining of fatigue but blood tests failed to show any cause for this.

Miss Roberts, a nurse, said that she was phoned on Saturday, 28 May 1994 by Joanna Reid, a former vet, who became an NHS manager working at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, who told her that Claire had died.

She told the court that she arranged with Miss Reid to go to the Websters' cottage to collect clothes for Webster.

Mr Ogg asked if she had noticed anything and she replied that she had seen three bottles of hospital medication on the coffee table.

Miss Roberts added: "I saw a box of Epilim. I knew it was an epilepsy drug."

She said she also saw a bottle of Carbamezipine, another epilepsy drug, and another bottle which she couldn't identify. All of the bottles were, she claimed, issued by an Aberdeen hospital.

Miss Roberts said she asked Miss Reid if Claire or Webster suffered from epilepsy and claimed she told her: "I don't know who's got epilepsy."

The jury was told that Miss Reid then said to Miss Roberts that Webster had asked her to take the drugs to him in the hospital.

Miss Roberts said: "I am certain of that. That definitely happened. She put them into a Tesco bag."

She was then asked if Webster, whom she had worked alongside at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, suffered from epilepsy and replied: "No."

Under cross-examination defence QC Edgar Prais asked Miss Roberts: "Is it not true you have simply got it in for Malcolm Webster?" and she denied this.

She was then asked if she thought he was over promoted and said that she thought it was odd for an enrolled nurse to have been promoted because of his computer skills to a grade equivalent to that of matron.

Mr Prais then asked Miss Roberts: "In a statement given on 28 March, 2008 the police asked you to describe what you saw in the cottage and you didn't mention the drugs?" And she replied: "I was trying to filter out what was important. I was asked to described the room."

Mr Prais then said: "All of this was a long time ago. You might have got a lot of it wrong." She replied: "There's some bits I remember and others I don't."

Webster also denies trying to kill his second Felicity Drumm in Auckland, New Zealand, in 1999 to cash in on their life insurance.

He is also alleged to have formed a fraudulent scheme between 2004 and 2008 to enter into a bigamous marriage.