When I met William, my once-glamorous life turned into a hellish nightmare. By Mhairi Campbell, 64
As a smartly dressed figure approached my table, I felt pleasantly surprised.
A friend had arranged for me to go on a blind date with her friend William at a local pub.
I’d been reluctant at first, but as the conversation flowed, I felt happy I’d taken a chance.
William told me he worked as a floor layer, and I talked about my job at a beauty counter in a department store.
‘Weren’t you in a beauty pageant once?’ he asked.
I realised my friend had told him about my modelling days.
‘I was a finalist in Miss Scotland when I was 17,’ I replied.
‘I can’t believe I’m on a date with someone like you,’ he said.
I appreciated the compliment, and William seemed kind.
We started a relationship, and things moved fast.
I felt lucky, as being in my 50s, I’d started to fear I’d be single forever.
My daughter had long since moved out of my home in Scotland, and it was lovely to have company.
But, William liked to smoke cannabis.
Whenever I asked him to stop, he’d lose his temper and start shouting and swearing.
One day, he flew off the handle when we were out together in public.
An undercover police officer witnessed it, and arrested him for breach of the peace.
William had to go to court and was sentenced to three months in prison.
When I visited him, he made a shocking confession.
‘I’ve been done for domestic violence before,’ he said.
He’d never been physically aggressive towards me, so it was difficult to wrap
my head around.
After he was
released, he’d
cook me dinner and buy me presents.
So, whenever he did have an angry outburst,
I let it slide.
We’d been together four years when he came into money from the sale of his old house.
‘I want to invest it in property,’ he said.
‘You should look at houses
in Spain,’ I suggested. ‘They’re much cheaper.’
We visited, and found a property we liked.
It needed work, but it was exactly the kind of project that William was looking to throw himself into.
In the months that followed, we travelled back and forth, doing the place up.
But the money quickly ran out.
William grew frustrated, and turned to cannabis and alcohol.
It infuriated me, and our arguments became physical.
On one occasion in Spain, our neighbours called the police.
William was given a restraining order.
But a couple of days later, he knocked on my front door.
‘You’re not supposed to be here,’ I said.
‘It’s my f***ing home,’ he replied.
I didn’t want another fight, so
I let him in. But then he started accusing me of calling the police on him.
I’d had enough.
‘I’m booking a flight home,’
I told him.
Then he started asking me
for money. And when I told
him I didn’t have any, he
began to shout.
I walked into another room
to get away from him, but he followed me.
So I grabbed my car keys from the coffee table and went to open the front door.
But as my hand touched
the handle, I felt a heavy blow to my back.
I collapsed to my knees, and when I turned around, I was horrified to see that William was holding what looked to
be a carving knife.
Then, he plunged the blade into my left arm.
I tried to pull myself up off the floor, but he stabbed me again, in the side.
Blood pooled around me.
‘You need to stop!’ I begged.
‘I can’t, it’s gone too far now,’ he said.
I managed to crawl to the bedroom, and pulled myself up on to the bed.
Within moments, the sheets were soaked with blood.
William followed and slashed the bed with the knife.
‘You should write a letter to your daughter,’ he said, before storming out the room.
‘Please call for help!’ I shouted.
‘I can’t do that,’ he said.
I begged him not to leave
me there to die, as I started
to drift in and out of consciousness.
I thought, This is the end
for me.
William returned with towels, expecting me to mop up the blood.
‘I’ve called an ambulance,’ he told me.
Then he left, and I heard the front door close behind him.
I didn’t believe he’d actually phoned for help. So I waited until he was far enough away, and with the last of my strength, screamed for help.
Minutes later, my neighbour’s grown-up daughter stepped into the room.
Her eyes widened in horror.
She called for an ambulance, and explained that she’d seen William running from our home.
He hadn’t locked the door.
I must have passed out, as when I opened my eyes again,
I was in hospital.
My left arm was bandaged, and I had a catheter.
I knew I was in a bad way.
Two police officers and an interpreter appeared at my bedside.
‘William got on a plane a couple of hours after the attack,’ one of officers said. ‘We’re still trying to find him.’
But days passed and police couldn’t track him down.
A guard stood outside my hospital room 24 hours a day, in case William came back.
I’d suffered massive internal bleeding.
The stab to my
back had punctured my lungs, and mesh had to be inserted
to strengthen tissue
in my bowel where the knife had scraped it.
It was two weeks before I was discharged.
But as my home was still a crime scene, I had to stay at
a women’s refuge.
Weeks later, doctors told
me I was well enough to fly home to Scotland.
But it was terrifying, as William was still on the run.
It was 10 months before police found and arrested him.
He was extradited to Spain, where he remained in custody.
Meanwhile, I developed a hernia, caused by the stab wound to my side, and I
needed an operation.
But in time, I gave evidence over video link during a visit
to Spain.
William shot me a chilling look through the screen.
In court, William McDonald, 61, of Rutherglen, near Glasgow, pleaded not guilty
to attempted murder.
He tried to claim that I
had inflicted the injuries on myself in a bid to keep his home in Spain.
I thought, How could I have stabbed myself in the back?
But the ridiculous accusation, only revealed William’s true nature – he was arrogant enough to think he could get away with anything.
The court heard that William had used bleach to try to get
rid of the blood stains.
Towels he’d used to mop up the blood were found in the washing machine, which was running when paramedics arrived.
At the end of the trial, William was found guilty of attempted murder.
He was sentenced to 14 years and 11 months in prison, and handed a 24-year restraining order, stopping him from going within 500 metres of me.
He was also ordered to pay me £20,000 in compensation.
Later, William tried to appeal his conviction, but was unsuccessful.
Now, I’m trying to rebuild my life. But it’s not been easy.
I was diagnosed with PTSD, and the trauma has stopped me forging a meaningful relationship.
But for now, I’m happy to remain single, and focus on healing the emotional and mental scars.
I’ll need further operations to keep replacing the mesh in my bowel. But I fought for my life that terrifying night when William me left for dead.
I’m not a victim. I’m a survivor.