A city of London IT worker who is accused of trying to murder 11 people in a fire at a Highland holiday home was suffering from “drug induced psychosis”, a court heard.
Kieran Ridley, 32, is on trial for starting a blaze at a property near Mallaig in October 2015.
His mother Yvonne-Ann gave evidence at the High Court in Edinburgh yesterday, and told how a doctor concluded that he had the condition in the months before the fire.
Mrs Ridley, 73, from Worcester, said her son was once a “happy go lucky” individual.
But she said Kieran developed mental health problems after moving to London to work in IT for Dow Jones.
She said her son had “delusions” and spoke to her about “Big Brother” and the “thought police.”
His brother Duncan, 46, told jurors that Kieran thought a neighbour was a CIA agent.
Mr Ridley said he thought his brother used cannabis, cocaine, ecstasy and Ketamine.
Speaking about what Kieran said to him, Mr Ridley said: “It was quite matter-of-fact, that the television was speaking to him and when he was walking to work the billboard in the streets were talking to him and sometimes the computers at work were speaking to him.”
Prosecutors and Kieran’s defence team have agreed that he switched on a cooker and poured petrol on a bin in his family’s holiday home.
Jurors previously heard how Mr Ridley then left the property having locked the front and back doors and some windows, knowing people were inside.
The youngest person in the property at the time of the October 27 2015 fire was a two-year-old child.
However, Mr Ridley’s lawyers have pleaded not guilty and have lodged a special defence which states that he wasn’t criminally responsible for his actions due to him having a “mental disorder.”
Yesterday, Mrs Ridley told prosecution lawyer Geoffrey Forbes that family members arranged for the accused to see a doctor in 2013 and a medic concluded that Kieran’s mental health issues were attributable to him using cannabis.
The court heard that Kieran continued to struggle with his mental health and in 2015, another doctor diagnosed Kieran with “drug induced psychosis”.
Mrs Ridley told the court that in October 2015, she and other family members went to their holiday home in Mallaig for a break.
She told Mr Forbes that in the days leading up to the alleged crime, she was concerned for her son’s well being.
She added: “He was not well. He was worried looking. He was haggard looking. He was not comfortable.”
Mrs Ridley also told the court that her son also confided in her. She added: “He told me ‘I wish I could go back to where I was before I was born.”
Prosecutors claim that Mr Ridley “wilfully” set fire to a bin in the kitchen and poured “petrol, or similar accelerant” on surfaces opened gas valves on a cooker.
The Crown also alleges that he locked doors and windows and removed the keys, “all in the knowledge” that people were asleep inside and “did assault them by exposing them to the effects of said fire, all to the danger of their lives and you did attempt to murder them”.
Mr Ridley’s alleged adult victims are his mother, his brother Duncan, Heidi Fernandez Saenz, Leann Sainsbury, Mark Sainsbury, Callam Chapman and Thomas Robinson.
Four children aged between two and 16, all of whom cannot be named for legal reasons, were also in the property at the time of the fire.
The trial, before judge Craig Scott QC continues today.
