A wealthy Manchester businessman’s wife killed herself with a fatal overdose of anti-malaria tablets after she become ‘obsessed’ about plastic surgery over a mole ruining her glamorous looks.
Blonde haired Victoria Meppen-Walter, 44, had gone for treatment at one of Britain’s top cosmetic surgery clinics to have a mole removed from her forehead.
But afterwards she complained of a burning sensation in her face, arms and chest and claimed the surgeon who performed the operation at the Transform clinic in Cheshire was ‘evil’ and had ‘tried to poison her’.
Over the next two years Mrs Meppen-Walter, a former biology teacher, of Heywood, became angry and reclusive and even contacted the Dignitas assisted suicide clinic in Switzerland when she felt she could no longer cope.
She was referred to a psychiatrist who believed she was suffering from Persistent Somatoform Pain Disorder – where real pain is felt but caused by psychological problems.
But despite reassurances from doctors, family and friends, Victoria, originally from Ukraine, continued to blame the surgery carried out in September 2011 for her low moods.
She travelled to meet the founder of Friends at the End in Glasgow – a group campaigning to change the law regarding assisted suicide.
Five months after the meeting she was found dead by her stepdaughter on September 1 last year in a front storeroom of the £500,000 home she shared with her husband.
Found next to her body was an A4 note in her hand-writing which said ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ and a glass bowl containing a number of crushed Chloroquine tablets, which are used to help prevent malaria.
Three suicide notes written by Victoria and blaming the surgery for making her life a ‘hell’ were discovered by her husband Ashley, 64 -grandfather of former Manchester City star Courtney Meppen-Walter.
It emerged she had laid undiscovered at the property for four days.
At an inquest in Heywood Mr Meppen-Walter, managing director of a used car business, said his wife of 16 years had been happy and full of energy until the operation.
“She was a lovely person and always kept herself smart,” he said. “But after the operation she lost interest in a lot of things and became a bit obsessed with it and the people who performed it.
“She felt it had gone wrong. They left a scar on her head and she started getting pains in her face. I was concerned initially but it got to the point where I was listening to it every day and after a few weeks you don’t listen any more.
“She said it felt like pins and needles in her face and it spread to her chest. One doctor said she may have nerve damage and it could last for years or forever which made her very upset. She didn’t want to suffer the pain all her life.”
Mr Meppen-Walter said his wife, a keen reader and academic, began to lose interest in general day to day activities and started to put on weight.
“She became a bit of a recluse and wasn’t the same person,” he added. “I saw her every day but she had a bit of a habit of locking herself in her room because we had separate bedrooms. She used to read a lot and always had done and sometimes I wouldn’t see her all day and she would stay in her room.
“On the last week before it happened she took me out a couple of times and we went to a few restaurants. That was unusual because I always paid but she said she wanted to because it was her treat. She was behaving a little bit different to normal. Looking back I can think it wasn’t normal but at the time it didn’t raise alarm bells.”
On Friday August 28 Mr Meppen-Walter found three letters addressed to Victoria’s mother, brother and him on her bed and immediately called police.
Due to a search of her laptop by family friend Adam Chadwick, calls were also made to the Dignitas clinic and the Swiss authorities.
Email correspondence with the company led the panicked family to wrongly believe she had travelled to the country to end her life.
But Mr Meppen-Walter’s stepdaughter Ainsley, 24, discovered Victoria’s body four days later when she went to fetch some bedsheets from the front room which was used for storage.
A post-mortem examination showed Victoria had 124mg of Chloroquine per litre of blood. Any dose above 2mg can prove toxic and fatal.
Dr Elizabeth Wilson, founder of Friends at the End who met Mrs Meppen-Walter, said: “Over a few phone calls I knew she had surgery which left her in pain she couldn’t stand. She wanted to meet me. I got the impression she had psychological issues.
“I tried to talk her out of travelling to Glasgow but she came in April and I found her on my doorstep.
”She was a very good-looking woman. We talked for some time and I believe she came up for something to aid her suicide. Over the next couple of months I spoke to her on the phone.
“The longer people talk to me the less chance there is of them committing suicide.”
On August 28 Dr Wilson received a phone call from Victoria where she said goodbye and revealed she had bought drugs from the internet.
“She was focussed on killing herself and always had been,” Dr Wilson added. “I would say she was obsessed with doing it. I spoke for five minutes with her and just said goodbye because it was obvious she had made her mind up.”
Victoria told her GP that she thought the doctor who completed the operation had intentionally hurt her, was evil and had poisoned her.
She was referred to psychiatrist Dr Ganesh Gadekar who gave a diagnosis of Persistent Somatoform Pain Disorder with Adjustment Disorder and depressive symptoms – however Victoria refused to believe she had a mental illness.
Reaching a conclusion of suicide, coroner Lisa Hashmi said: “I firmly believe the deceased had significant psychological issues following what she believed to have been a mismanaged operation
”I believe she was suffering and despite seeking help with these difficulties she found it difficult to cope.
“I believe due to the instability in her mental health, her contact with Dignitas and Friends at the End and in particular the confidence she established with Dr Wilson that the actions taken by her were intended to end her own life.
“I can’t say objectively what impact the surgery was. While the aesthetic outcome appeared to be satisfactory it appears it had ramifications on how she felt about herself.”
Picture courtesy of Facebook, with thanks.
