Product Description

On 19 May 1979, a British nurse, Helen Smith, and a Dutch tugboat captain, Johannes Otten, fell to their deaths from a balcony at a party given in Jeddah by British surgeon Richard Arnot and his wife Penny. When Helen Smith's father started to investigate what was initially seen as a tragic accident, rumours of sex orgies, conspiracy and murder began to circulate. Taken into custody and eventually sentenced to imprisonment and a public flogging for the local crime of serving alcohol, Richard Arnot was released as the result of intervention by the British government and was deported back to the UK. In the wake of Ron Smith's determined campaign to prove that foul play as associated in his daughter's death, Arnot was hounded by the press and shunned by the medical profession. The 1982 inquest into the death resulted in an open verdict which fostered continuing doubt and speculation about the real story behind the events of the fateful evening. Arnot, who moved to Australia to begin a new life, now tells his own story.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #170439 in Books
• Published on: 1999-02-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 223 pages

From the Publisher
Read an exclusive extract in the Daily Mail very soon!

From the Back Cover
A true-life tale, so compelling that it reads like a novel.

Jeddah, 19 May 1979, A British nurse, Helen Smith, and a Dutch tugboat captain, Johannes Otten, fall twenty-three metres to their death at a party given by Dr Richard Arnot and his wife, Penny.

The Saudi Arabian authorities arrest the young doctor and his wife and eventually sentence them to imprisonment and a public flogging for serving alcohol. As a result of British government intervention, the couple are deported back to the United Kingdom.

Their attempts at a fresh start are thwarted when Ron Smith, Helen's father, starts to investigate what was initially seen as a tragic accident. Rumour and innuendo, whisperings of conspiracy and murder, begin to circulate in Ron Smith's unending obsession to prove foul play in association with his daughter's death.

Hounded by the British tabloid press, Richard Arnot moves to Australia. And the body of Helen Smith lies, still unburied, in a Leeds mortuary.

After years of silence, here is Richard Arnot's story.