Emma Tustin: Stepmum who killed Arthur Labinjo-Hughes 'poisoned with salt' by cellmates
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Emma Tustin, sentenced to life for torturing and killing her toddler stepson last year, has allegedly been killed by her prison inmates. The monstrous step-mother reportedly died of a salt overdose. Her cellmates laced her meals with salt and slowly watched her give up, reports said.
In June last year, Emma and her partner Thomas Hughes poisoned their son Arthur Labinjo-Hughes with salt after starving him.
A former cellmate of Emma, Elaine P, told the Mirror, "Some of the things we did were cruel – but she was crueller to Arthur so she deserved it." After spending almost six weeks with Emma, Elaine also said, "Emma hadn’t said anything about Arthur dying. She never mentioned him."
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Elaine also explained how Emma always felt sorry for herself and plotted her moves in a way to get everyone to sympathize with her. Elaine says the only time she's ever seen Emma genuinely upset over something is when Emma came back from her hearing and shared that Thomas did not look at her.
Emma was sentenced to jail for a minimum of 29 years. Emma killed Arthur by repeatedly slamming his head on a hard surface. At that point, the salt levels in Arthur's blood stream were so high that he could barely fight for his life. Paramedics, when they checked his levels thought maybe their equipment was broken.
What chance did poor Arthur Labinjo-Hughes have in this world with monsters like that around him. Unbelievably sad reading about everything that happened to him. RIP you brave boy. Im sorry on behalf of humanity that this happened to you 😢
— Nikhil Deol (@NikhilDeol7) December 6, 2021
She tried her best to hide these crimes from her inmates. Unfortunately for her, they caught wind of the horrific abuse. The manipulative mother framed her conviction in a way that put all the blame on Thomas. She said that because Thomas neglected their son, she's locked up.
Elaine also shared that she and Emma got into a fight. Elaine read about Arthur's demise and had some questions for Emma, to which Emma said she hadn't noticed and she used to just give him (Arthur) a towel.
Elaine thought this was strange as Emma mentioned giving Arthur a bath in a previous conversation.
Soon Emma was moved to a different cell but after the inmates learnt about Emma's crime, they were enraged and laced Emma's meals with salt.
Images shared by West Midland Police show how the couple was enjoying ice-cream from McDonald's on their couch, while poor Arthur was left starving in the hallway. In the same footage, the six-year old is disturbingly heard crying, "no one loves me". After repeating this phrase four times, he also said, "No one is going to feed me". In another clip at McDonald's, Arthur was heard yelling, "Daddy's going to throw me out the window".
Thomas Hughes, the father, on the other hand, has been jailed for life for a minimum of 21 years. He was found guilty of manslaughter but cleared of murder.