Fake Indian-origin doctor jailed for knife attack on family in UK

PTI, Feb 5, 2020, 9:57 AM IST

London: A man who pretended to be a doctor and then attempted to murder his wife and her family members over fears of his secret being exposed has been sentenced to 28 years’ imprisonment by a UK court.

Satya Thakor, a failed medical student, had faked his medical qualifications as he pretended to be busy with late-night shifts for seven years, Reading Crown Court was told as the 35-year-old was sentenced on Monday.

The prosecution told the court that in May last year he attempted to suffocate his mother-in-law Gita Laxman before arming himself with a knife to attack wife Nisha and brother-in-law Primal and sister-in-law Rishika.

Police found Thakor in the bath of the home in Wraysbury, Berkshire, where he had stabbed himself a number of times and was shouting about demons.

“You chose an extreme act of violence to get out of the difficulty that you were in. You could have stopped it as the madness that it was and as the idiotic decision that it was, but you chose not to,” Judge Paul Dugdale noted.

Thakor, his wife Nisha and daughter had traveled from their home in Leicester to his mother-in-law’s house when the attack happened. In addition to the prison sentence, Thakor has an indefinite restraining order imposed on him against his family, ‘Leicester Mercury’ reports.

The court heard that Thakor had been leaving home every day and pretending to go to work but had in fact been spending all day in the library, reading medical books.

He thought his secret was about to be exposed when his wife suggested a dream holiday to Los Angeles a trip he could not pay for because he had not been earning money.

“You had reached the very last weekend before your deceptions would have come crashing around you,” the judge said.

Thakor was found guilty of three counts of attempted murder and one count of causing grievous bodily harm with intent.

In a letter to the judge, Thakor wrote, “The shame of not being able to graduate as a doctor and the fear of admitting this would cause my family and friends to abandon me and my upcoming wedding to be called off, led me to lie and say that I had graduated and become a doctor.”

He had been briefly sectioned under the Mental Health Act after the knife attacks but was deemed fit for trial.

In a victim impact statement, his wife told the court, “The financial and emotional abuse he has inflicted on me is very real and I feel it every day.”

She met her husband while studying biochemistry at a university in London. After failing his exams to qualify as a doctor, he lied by saying he had passed and kept up the pretense for up to a decade.