Ex-wife jailed for sinking boat

A British woman was jailed for 18 months today for sinking her husband’s yacht on Valentine’s Day.

Mandy Fleming had gone to the Double Dragon in Brighton Marina for “menage-a-trois” with her then lover David Brown and his wife Nemone, the court heard.

But she “lost it” after seeing her estranged husband Adam had spent money on a new television and other items for the boat whilst saying he didn’t have any money.

She drilled three holes in the hull and turned on cooker gas taps which turned the £75,000 vessel into “an explosive bomb”.

Fleming of Sheerness, Kent, pleaded guilty to endangering life by causing criminal damage in 2004, when she appeared in court last month.

Old Bailey Judge Richard Hone told her: “You were a manipulative, angry and troubled individual.”

Fleming wept as she was told she would have to serve half the sentence, less the two and a half months she had initially spent in custody.

The court was told that turning on a light would have been enough to blow up the boat.

A marina official had gone aboard to pump out water and four people had been staying on vessels nearby.

Mark Gadsden, prosecuting, said an estimated £40,000 damage had been caused to the Double Dragon which had been bought during the couple’s marriage.

Fleming, 47, and haulage contractor Mr Fleming have since divorced. They wed two years before the incident and it was Fleming’s third marriage.

Mr Gadsden said: “She visited Brighton marina with her then new lover David Brown and his wife Nemone, the three of them being part of a menage-a-trois.”

After seeing the new electrical equipment and some bills for work which had been done on the yacht, she rang Mr Fleming and berated him for spending money on the vessel, he said.

“She returned to the shore and equipped herself with a drill which she took on to the boat and drilled three holes. Between them, they were sufficient to cause the boat to sink.”

The sinking boat was seen the next morning and berthing master Chris Cheyne smashed a porthole to get into the yacht, intending to pump it out.

Mr Gadsden said: “Mrs Fleming had left open the gas taps on the cooker, thus turning it into an explosive bomb.

“He noticed a wedding photograph of the couple in a glass frame had been smashed deliberately.

“A volatile mixture of propane gas and air had been created and all it would have needed was for someone to turn on an electric light or torch, or respond to a mobile phone or radio, for it to have exploded.”

Mr Cheyne had said: “I had a radio on me and I knew the smallest spark would trigger off an explosion.”

Police later found an entry in Fleming’s diary which read: “Lost it, got drill and sunk boat. Now I am in s***.”