Civil servant claims he poured away abortion pills

A Home Office worker accused of trying to make his girlfriend miscarry said he poured abortion pills down the sink because he was worried about the safety of her child and dog.

Darren Burke, 43, is accused of trying to drug Laura Slade with Mifepristone, a prescription drug used to terminate pregnancies.

Burke said he bought a packet of pills online for about £200 after hearing that Ms Slade was pregnant and he had it delivered to his mother’s address where he was staying at the time.

He said he got the pills after discussing the option of an abortion with Ms Slade.

‘Once we had the conversation she was happy with that as an option so I went to procure it,’ Burke told Isleworth Crown Court.

On 4 December 2020, three weeks after discovering she was pregnant, he went to visit Ms Slade at her flat in Chiswick.

He told police after his arrest that he was keeping the pills in his car so that his mother didn’t find them.

Burke said he drove round and had only taken the pills into Ms Slade’s flat because he kept them in the glove compartment with his keys and wallet and that he had picked up everything at once.

The pair had a long conversation, about 30-40 minutes, Burke told the court.

‘It was an emotional conversation about, do you want the baby, not want the baby, do you want me to leave my wife,’ he said.

‘I made her some drinks because she looked a bit pale and we had lots of conversation about what was going on.

‘I went to the kitchen, mixed some water and orange juice, because the juice is a bit heavy, took it to the room and said you need to keep your liquids and your vitamins up.’

‘Was there a point at which you realised she was not going to change her mind about having the baby?’ David Spens QC, defending, asked.

‘Yes, when we first sat down I could see it in her eyes.’

‘How did the meeting end?’

‘We did not hug. The decision had been made, we were having the baby. I will go and face my wife and tell her I’ve been a bad husband.

‘I picked up my cup and I think I had a saucer of Hobnob biscuits. I asked her, do you want your orange juice and water that I made.

‘She said no so I took them into the kitchen and put them in the sink.

‘I had the pills and threw them into the bin and then looked and thought, that’s not a responsible way to dispose of drugs, I need to do it properly.

‘So I picked them up and put them in the sink but they were quite big, they wouldn’t go down.

‘The sink was quite full. I took one of the glasses that was there, used it to break up one of the tablets and washed it around in the glass.’

Burke said he thinks he remembers crushing three pills and when Mr Spens asked him why he didn’t leave them in the bin he said: ‘I was worried about her kids getting them.

‘I had been told that her son was autistic, on the spectrum. Also the dog likes to eat anything, he can get in the bin sometimes. I was worried about the safety of everyone in the flat.’

Mr Spens took Burke through the Whatsapp messages he had exchanged with Ms Slade in mid November.

‘Did you ask her how she got pregnant?’ he asked.

‘Yes. I said how have you got pregnant when you are on the pill and she said it can happen sometimes. ‘

When, in interview, the police asked about his reaction to her becoming pregnant he said: ‘I was obviously shocked, I thought, bloody hell.

‘I trusted her to say, I am on the pill.

‘There was lots of backward and forwards, do you want the baby, do you not want the baby.

‘She was up and down about it, she said, “I’ve booked a clinic that I’ve used before.” It was a rollercoaster of emotions.

‘Honestly, I did not want it but then some days you do think, it’s a person.’

Burke, of Old Windsor, Berks denies unlawfully supplying a poison and administering a poison with intent to cause miscarriage.

‘How often would you have to lie to keep your affair a secret?’ Paul Jarvis, prosecuting, asked Burke.

‘Obviously I lied to my wife when I went and saw Laura, that was the only time I lied,’ replied Burke.

‘Does lying come easy to you?’

‘No.’

‘Does five years of keeping this secret make you a good liar?’

‘I am not a good liar.’

Mr Jarvis asked Burke where he bought the Mifepristone but he said he could not remember, nor could he remember when he bought them.

Burke also could not say what type of website he bought the pills from nor what country he bought them from.

‘Did you have any idea what was in those pills you were buying?’ Mr Jarvis asked.

‘I assume what it says on the packet.’

‘But you could not tell us where you bought them from. How can you say it is not a dodgy drug dealer selling those from the back of a van?’

‘I can’t answer that,’ Burke replied.

After Burke was arrested the police seized two laptops and two phones.

They were able to access his iPhone X and searched it for references of ‘Mifepristone’ and ‘abortion’ but found nothing.

They also found that he had deleted his browsing history from 6 November to 25 December 2020 and his search history from 29 October to 17 December.

When Mr Jarvis asked Burke why he had deleted his search history he said he didn’t want his wife to discover that he had been searching for abortion options.

‘These were not pills that could be dissolved,’ said Mr Jarvis. ‘Did it occur to you that what you were going to have to do, without her realising, was to break the tablets down and put them in a drink, and you would have to put them in a drink that was cloudy.’

‘No,’ replied Burke.
‘Is that why you offered to pop round with a latte or tea?’

‘It was an olive branch.’

‘You told the police these pills had been in the glove compartment of your car for some time. Was your decision to pick them out and take them into the flat?’

‘It was reactive,’ replied Burke. ‘I grabbed them out with my wallet and put them in my pocket. I grabbed everything out before I went upstairs.

‘I thought at the time if the conversation does crop up then they are there. I was hoping it would crop up but it didn’t.’

‘Did you really think that if that conversation happened in her flat that she would be up for taking the pills you had bought from the internet?’

‘I don’t know… I bought them online, I can only assume that I would have bought them from a reputable place. We would have talked about it, where I got them.’

‘You knew perfectly well that if she found out you had come in the flat with those pills she would have sent you packing,’ said Mr Jarvis.

‘I had them in case the conversation came up but it didn’t.’

Burke said that once he knew Ms Slade had not changed her mind about having the baby he disposed of the pills in the kitchen by dissolving them in the glass and pouring them down the sink.

When asked why he didn’t wash up the glass despite being in the kitchen for three to five minutes he said to Mr Jarvis: ‘Would you do that?’

‘It would be a nice thing to do,’ the prosecutor replied. ‘The reality is you could not afford to leave that glass of orange juice sitting on the table in case she discovered what was in it.’

‘No,’ said Burke.

Mr Jarvis also pointed out that there were other ways to dispose of the tablets if they were still in the packet at the time of his leaving to which Burke replied: ‘I made the decision there and then.’

He also asked Burke why he did not explain to Ms Slade that he had gotten rid of the tablets in the sink when she messaged him to ask what was in the drink.

‘I couldn’t do that because I was driving,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t text that because it would be dangerous.’
‘But you managed to say f*ck off,’ said Mr Jarvis. ‘And it is all grammatically correct.

‘The truth is that by this day you were desperate for her to have a termination but you knew she would not do it of her own accord and you knew that all your efforts to persuade her had failed.

‘As an act of pure selfishness you decided to trick her and that plan failed too.’

‘I did not do anything you are accusing me of,’ said Burke. ‘I did not have a plan.’

Burke, of Old Windsor, Berks denies unlawfully supplying a poison and administering a poison with intent to cause miscarriage.

The trial continues.