A war widow attacked her second husband in a drunken tirade at her £1.5 million mansion, a court has heard.
Christina Schmid, whose first husband, Staff Sgt Olaf Schmid, died defusing a Taliban bomb in Afghanistan, was found guilty on Tuesday of biting, scratching and hitting Adam Plumb, 41, “in the balls”.
She had denied two counts of assaulting a woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, and Mr Plumb at her home in Ugborough, Devon, in September last year.
Schmid, 49, became a figurehead for bereaved war widows and widowers after Staff Sgt Schmid died during his final day of duty in the war-torn country in 2009.
She received a George Cross on his behalf after his death and campaigned for better pensions for war widows and higher salaries for soldiers.
Newton Abbot magistrates’ court heard that she physically and verbally abused Mr Plumb while “under the influence of alcohol” during a late night row on Sept 17 2023.
“I was trying to sleep and she was poking me with her nails,” Mr Plumb told the court. “I got out of bed and tried to sleep in another bedroom.
“She was grabbing me and putting her cold feet on my back. I told her to leave me alone.”
Mr Plumb then went to a dressing room, where he said Schmid “kept shouting” at him.
‘‘She trapped me in the corner of the dressing room,” he said. “She was literally just going at me. She was just attacking me. Hitting me in the balls. Kicking me. I could not get her off of me.
“The dressing room is about 4ft wide so it’s not very wide. When I went to leave she bit me in the middle of my back.”
Footage of the altercation shown to the court showed Mr Plumb saying: “Get off me. You are a disgusting woman.”
He was later heard saying: “You f—ing bit me. You f—ing b—h. You horrible woman.”
The court heard that Mr Plumb escaped to another room and shut himself in before calling the police.
When Pc Alexander Lyons-Martin arrived, he found Schmid in the kitchen, who told him she was “a victim of domestic violence” and that she “had been assaulted by Adam”.
Pc Lyons-Martin then arrested Schmid, who married Mr Plumb, a divorced father of one, in 2013.
Schmid told the court that she had been woken up by a “very angry” Mr Plumb after he found out that she wanted a divorce.
“He is beating me and kicks me and my head bangs on the bed side table,” she said. “I was very dazed and confused.”
District Judge Stuart Smith said there was “no evidence” of Schmid suffering any injuries. He found her guilty of both counts of assault.
He said the evidence showed that she had cut her own nose with her nails and put blood on her husband’s T-shirt in a false attempt to prove that she had been assaulted by him.
“You have falsely attempted to maliciously manufacture injuries to your nose as an attempt to portray yourself as a victim of domestic abuse while all the time you were the aggressor,” he said.
Schmid will be sentenced at Plymouth magistrates’ court on Dec 23.
