A woman dubbed the Internet Black Widow was released from prison in Canada on Friday, prompting police to issue a warning to potential victims - elderly men looking for love. What could have earned a sweet-talking 80-year-old such a sinister reputation?
Alex Strategos was lonely and searching for romance when he met Melissa Ann Shepard on an online dating site.
"At first, I thought she seemed very nice," Strategos, now 84, told the BBC from his home in Florida. Shepard drove down from Canada and quickly moved in with Strategos, who described her as a "very classy lady".
But he soon discovered she was less classy than she seemed. "I went to hospital," says Strategos. "She sent me there."
Their relationship was one of many that have resulted in Shepard serving time in prison.
This week she was released after two years, nine months and 10 days in jail for spiking the coffee of a new partner, Fred Weeks, her neighbour in a quiet retirement community in Nova Scotia. According to court documents, she knocked on his door and told him she was lonely, and she'd heard he was lonely too.
The couple had a civil union ceremony in his living room, and although the marriage was reportedly never certified, they went off on honeymoon to Newfoundland. Prosecutors said Shepard gave Weeks heavy doses of sedatives during the journey, leaving him unable to distinguish between the reverse and drive gears in his car, and to start the vehicle when they were disembarking from a ferry.
The next day he needed a wheelchair, could not put on his shoes and did not know where his car keys were, the court heard. But it was not until he was hospitalised after falling out of bed that the drugs were found in his system and police realised something was wrong.
Image copyright AP
Image caption Fred Weeks says Melissa Shepard is a "smooth actor"
Image copyright AP
Image caption Weeks fell out of bed while drugged at the Chamber's Guest House Bed and Breakfast in Nova Scotia
Shepard was initially charged with attempted murder but later convicted on a lesser charge of "administering a noxious substance".
In an interview with The Canadian Press this month, Weeks said he did not want Shepard to come near him. "She's too smooth an actor," he said. "She kept me in the dark for a long time, telling me her stories... Everything was a lie that she told me."
Strategos believes Shepard drugged him too - by spiking his ice cream. He says she also stole about $20,000 from him during the few weeks they were together. She served five years in a Florida jail after pleading guilty in 2005 to seven charges, including forgery and grand theft from a person aged 65 or older.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-35838340
