Businesswoman Accused of Poisoning Two Schoolgirls Found Hiding

A businesswoman accused of killing two schoolgirls in Colombia with poisoned raspberries has been found hiding in London after her Buxton water bottle gave her location away.

Zulma Guzman Castro was rescued from the River Thames near Battersea Bridge early on Tuesday morning after being named in her homeland as the alleged killer of Ines de Bedout, 14, and 13-year-old Emilia Forero.

An Interpol Red Notice had been issued for the 54-year-old after she was linked to the delivery of the dessert, which was laced with heavy metal thallium. Castro is expected to face extradition proceedings when she is deemed fit to travel.

Ms Guzman Castro was accused of killing the schoolgirls in a likely “act of vengeance” after an affair with Ines’ dad Juan de Bedout. She denies any involvement in her deaths – but over the weekend she raised suspicions in her homeland she might be in the Britain by constantly drinking from a bottle of Buxton mineral water during an exclusive interview with Colombian news outlet Focus Noticias.

Newspaper El Tiempo was one of the first to pick up on the fact that the water bottle could offer a clue to her current whereabouts, and a source said: “The bottle of water she drank from was Buxton Natural Mineral Water, a reputed product which is mainly commercialised in the UK, although it can be purchased online.”

“The size of the bottle she was drinking are sold in street shops, which would indicate Guzman is in an apartment or house and not in a hotel.”

Investigators are said to have followed this up, ruling out the earlier line of enquiry which suggested she was in Argentia, where she initially fled. The businesswoman, who founded a car-sharing firm called Car-B, admitted to having an affair with the girls’ dather Juan de Bedout in her Focus Noticias interview, as well as confessing she had put a GPS tracker on his car.

She said: “Regrettably I was his lover for many years, more than six. The relationship with him was basically clandestine and we would see each other in my house or elsewhere in Bogota. Our relationship ended at the beginning of 2020.”

Confirming she had tried to track his movements, she added: “I committed an error many years ago. Precisely when I was in a relationship with Juan, out of jealousy and because I was entangled in all the lies, he challenged me, saying that I wasn’t capable of knowing where he was hiding.

“I told him that I was capable, and that’s when I looked for a way to put the GPS in the car.”

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Denying any involvement in the schoolgirls’ poisoning, she said: “I am a mother, and that must be unbearable pain, and I understand that for that reason they want to find the culprit and use all possible means to do so, but I am not that culprit.”

“The strategy is clearly to completely destroy me before any legal proceedings, to destroy my image and give a version that would destroy me without any trial, without any guarantee of a fair trial at this time.”

Colombian authorities have made a request to the UK for her capture and it is understood a warrant was issued by Westminster Magistrates Court for her arrest earlier this week.

She was rushed to hospital yesterday after being rescued from the Thames near London Bridge, with rescuers said to have lit up the river with searchlights before locating her.

A Met Police spokesman said of yesterday morning’s rescue: “Police were called at 06:45hrs on Tuesday, 16 December to reports of a woman in distress on Battersea Bridge.

“The Met’s Marine Policing Unit recovered a woman in her 50s from the water at 07.14hrs and she was taken to hospital, where her injuries have since been deemed not life-threatening or life-changing.”