A former chiropractor in Alabama was sentenced to life in prison on Wednesday for feeding his wife lead-tainted vitamins over multiple months while they were in the middle of heated divorce proceedings.
Brian Thomas Mann, 36, was found guilty on attempted murder charges in June for using lead he stockpiled from a construction project at his office to lace vitamins he gave to his 26-year-old wife, Hannah Pettey.
Pettey started taking the vitamins in the summer of 2021 as their contentious divorce battle started to take a toll on her health and she sought to strengthen her immune system.
Mann’s contractor, Danny Hill, testified that his remodel for the chiropractor’s office included lining the walls of an X-ray room with lead, and that there wound up being some left over.
When the lead-laced pills took their inevitable toll, Pettey was hospitalized for two months.
At the time, Pettey had eight times the normal amount of lead a person should have in their body and wound up needing around-the-clock treatment to drain her colon, AL.com reported.
Pettey thankfully recovered, but lost 40 pounds and still had a large amount of lead in her system after she was released from the hospital.
All the while, Mann continued to pressure his sickly wife to purchase more life insurance policies, WAAVY reported.
The dangerously high levels of lead particles in her system pushed authorities to launch an investigation into her bizarre ailment that they determined was an elaborate scheme crafted by Mann to “intentionally cause [Pettey] to unwittingly ingest particles of lead.”
Mann originally cooperated with police and handed over all of Pettey’s vitamins, but quickly tried to turn the tables in his favor.
He tried to convince a nurse at the hospital that “he did an X-ray on himself and observed a substance in his gut, which he believed to be lead,” according to an affidavit.
When the nurse insisted on running another X-ray so she could check, Mann “became visibly nervous, and she thought he may leave.”
A second scan did pinpoint a “substance in [Mann’s] colon,” but it “didn’t appear to have been there for very long.”
Days later, an anonymous tipster called police and attested to Mann’s previous office remodel and claimed that they’d left the extra lead with the chiropractor.
Had Pettey died, Mann would have collected $1 million in life insurance.
Mann was cuffed in September 2022, months after he launched the plot against his wife.
The judge agreed to the maximum sentence after the state prosecutors insisted that the entire plot demonstrated Mann’s callous disregard for Pettey’s life.
“I believe this was a good glimpse into Brian Mann’s character. I don’t know if he took this seriously or if he takes anything seriously outside of himself and his pursuit of money. It’s a peek into his soul,” lead prosecutor Garrick Vickery told WAFF.
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