'Ricin' letter schoolboy sentenced

Friday, 31 October 2003 12:00 AM

A schoolboy who sent a letter claiming to contain the deadly poison ricin to Prince William and a bottle of aromatherapy oil laced with caustic soda to Cherie Blair has been sentenced to three years in a young offenders institution.

Paul Smith, 17, from Dumbarton, also admitted sending letters containing a powder which he claimed was either anthrax or ricin to a number of people and organisations.

Targets of the hoax included the House of Commons, Scotland Yard, the Scottish Parliament, the Home Office and the BBC.

Smith, now a sixth-year pupil at Dumbarton Academy, was aged 15 when he sent 44 letters between August 2001 and February last year.

He also pleaded guilty to sending packages containing bottles of a substance which he claimed to be eucalyptus aromatherapy oil, along with instructions to rub it onto the face and hands. The bottles actually contained caustic soda, which can burn the skin and damage the throat and stomach lining if inhaled.

These packages were sent to Mrs Blair and to Margaret Ashcroft, an aide to Liberal Democrat MSP Mike Rumbles.

The High Court in Edinburgh heard that Smith was recruited over the internet by the head of an anti-English Scottish terrorist organisation to send the letters.

Edgar Prais QC, defending, argued that Smith had been "naive, gullible and immature" but not "callous".

"He is not in any sense a terrorism junkie," he added.

Passing sentence Lord Kingarth told Smith: "You became involved in a sinister and sustained campaign which was calculated to cause and did cause considerable distress and alarm to a number of people and a very considerable disruption."

Smith was sentenced to spend three years in a young offenders' institution, with a 12-month supervision order on his release.

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