IT worker guilty of murdering married couple with fentanyl-laced drink

An IT worker who poisoned a married couple with fentanyl as part of a warped bid to seize control of their business is facing a whole life sentence after being found guilty of murder.

Luke D’Wit, 34, slipped the synthetic opioid into ‘health drinks’ which he gave to Stephen Baxter, 61, and his wife Carol, 64, at their home in West Mersea in Essex last Easter.

The loner befriended the couple while working for their shower mat firm Cazsplash and later targeted them in what prosecutors described as ‘a web of deception and manipulation’, culminating in the rewriting of their will.

Jurors at Chelmsford Crown Court heard he invented the fake persona of a fake Florida doctor who was advising Mrs Baxter about how to treat her thyroid condition Hashimoto’s Thyroditis.