A Missouri woman, aged 47, is facing serious charges after she was reportedly filmed contaminating her husband’s Mountain Dew with Round Up weed killer. The husband claimed that his wife, Michelle Y. Peters, was upset because he did not show enough gratitude for the 50th birthday party she had organized for him. Peters was arrested on Monday and charged with first-degree domestic assault and armed criminal action, as announced by the authorities.
The husband reported to the Laclede County Sheriff’s Office on the morning of June 24, suspecting that his wife was attempting to poison him. He was the sole consumer of Mountain Dew in their household and had noticed an unusual taste in the beverage around May 1. He fell ill shortly after consuming the drink but initially dismissed the strange taste. However, after a few weeks, he experienced symptoms such as a sore throat, diarrhea, vomiting, and coughing up a thick brown/yellow mucus.
He noted that the Mountain Dew he consumed outside his home tasted normal, but all the two-liter bottles stored in their garage had the same peculiar taste. This led him to suspect that someone was tampering with the bottles. He decided to review footage from a camera installed in the garage.
The husband claimed that the video footage showed Peters removing a two-liter bottle of Diet Mountain Dew from the garage refrigerator and a bottle of Roundup weed killer into the house. He alleged that Peters then returned the soda to the refrigerator and placed the Roundup back on the garage shelf.
Fearing for his safety, the husband handed over a copy of the video recording and the bottle of Mountain Dew from the garage refrigerator to an unnamed individual, in case he succumbed to poisoning. He also changed his routine, placing new and untouched Mountain Dew bottles in the refrigerator. He claimed that each time he did this, Peters would contaminate it with Roundup. He also noticed that the original Roundup bottle was nearly empty and a new, unopened bottle had recently appeared on the garage shelf.
When the husband informed Peters about his illness, she allegedly suggested that he might have contracted COVID and advised him to avoid contact with their grandchildren. On June 24, he also reportedly filmed Peters adding insecticide to his Mountain Dew bottle. When asked about a possible motive, the husband speculated that Peters might be having an affair or could be seeking the payout from his $500,000 life insurance policy.
Upon questioning, Peters initially denied the allegations, claiming she was mixing the beverage and insecticide to create a homemade weed killer she had seen on Pinterest. However, when confronted with the video evidence and the bottles her husband had collected, she reportedly confessed, stating she should have opted for divorce instead.
Peters admitted to adding insecticide from the basement to the Mountain Dew bottle and placing it in the garage refrigerator on the evening of June 23, 2024. She claimed she was angry at her husband for not appreciating the 50th birthday party she had thrown for him. She also confessed to adding Roundup to his Mountain Dew out of spite. Glyphosate, the main ingredient in Roundup, can lead to multiple organ failure and death if ingested, as per the National Pesticide Information Center.
Peters is currently detained in the Laclede County Detention Center without bond and is set to appear in court on July 2.