A man who survived three assassination attempts by his wife has claimed she is the victim after she had an affair with his best friend.
Ray Weatherall, 59, is fighting a battle with terminal cancer in a bid to be with his wife Hayley, 38, again once she is freed from prison.
Hayley schemed with her secret lover Glenn Pollard – her husband’s best friend of 20 years – to kill her devoted spouse in a wild series of plots – all three of which he survived.
She and Pollard were both jailed for life after he endured being shot in the face, a swimming pool heater explosion and a plan to end his life with sleeping pills and insulin.
But more than five years after Hayley was jailed Mr Weatherall says she is the ‘victim’ and the blame falls on Mr Pollard.
In new footage, Mr Weatherall says: ‘I want her to come back to me.’
When asked if Hayley is still welcome at the family home, the father-of-seven says: ‘As far as I’m concerned, yes.
‘Well, because I love her. And if it weren’t for Mr Pollard, none of this would have ever happened.’
When asked if his wife is the victim, Mr Weatherall says: ‘Oh, most definitely.’
He added: ‘Me and Glenn were best of friends, and all of a sudden I found out that he’d been cheating with my wife.
‘Of course thing didn’t go too well at that point. I was sat in the front room and his phone was on the arm of my chair, he was sitting in the chair next to me, and all of a sudden it went off – ”love you, Hayley”.’
Mr Weatherall still takes 200-mile trips every month to see Hayley in HMP Bronzefield, in Ashford, Surrey, and says their interactions are affectionate.
‘There has been no break,’ he says. ‘She gives me a cuddle and a kiss and we sit together, and we always have the family room where it’s got a double sofa.
‘It’s lovely. I wouldn’t want to be not seeing her, let’s put it that way. I’d feel all wrong.’
The father, who has terminal brain cancer, still has the bullet scar and second degree burns to remind him of the incidents.
‘My aim is to survive long enough so Hayley can be released from prison and she can come back home,’ he previously told the Mirror. ‘This house is as much hers as it is mine. I can’t wait to have her back. I should’ve been dead years ago.
‘It’s a miracle I am here. My aim is to see her walk through that door. I will stay alive long enough for that. People say I’m mad but I don’t care. I visit her each month and we kiss and hug and it is lovely.
‘Hayley was brainwashed. She was a fool. She has always been easily led astray. And she’s serving a life sentence for that stupidity. But I blame my old friend Glenn entirely.’
Mr Weatherall says he doesn’t ever want to see his ex-best friend again, and he won’t be invited to Hayley’s release party.
He and Pollard had been pals for more than 20 years and went shooting together.
The loyal husband has previously amazed onlookers for his forgiveness – buying his wife Christmas presents to enjoy in prison just months after she was jailed.
A family friend told the Mirror that he wanted to give her perfume, but as liquids were not allowed in the prison he chose a Boyzone CD.
Despite a judge calling Mrs Weatherall ‘cold and calculated’ and ‘impatient’ for her husband to die, her husband claimed she was ‘made out to be worse than she is’.
Ray had been told he had months to live when Heather, who goes by the name Arthur, shot him in the face like a ‘sniper’ after a string of failed attempts on his life.
They included a swimming pool heater explosion which left him with second degree burns, drowning him while fishing and poisoning him with insulin.
Mr Weatherall remained ignorant that his wife and his best friend of 20 years were trying to kill him after they planned a new life together.
At their trial, Maidstone Crown Court was told the non-fatal shooting triggered a long and intricate Kent Police investigation, which uncovered a string of other unsuccessful attempts on the man’s life, planned before and after the shooting.
Shortly after they were jailed, Mr Weatherall told Good Morning Britain that Glenn had been the main instigator of the plot, and that his wife was ‘dragged into it’.
He said: ‘I’m disgusted with Glenn and his daughter. Glenn was most certainly the driver of it all. I’m disgusted that my wife for getting involved with it all.
‘It was probably two or three months prior to me finding out what was actually going on. She started being a little bit cold towards me.
‘Up until that point we never had any issues whatsoever. I still don’t understand how she got involved in it all.’
Their schemes began unravelling in January after Ray’s niece Emma Worsfold tipped off police that they were trying to kill Ray, after she learned of the affair.
Kent Police raided their homes and quickly recovered the bolt-action rifle that was used to shoot him.
Electrical devices were analysed and hundreds of messages were discovered between Glenn and Heather, including about how they planned to kill his love rival.
The jury was also told about other events that had threatened the victim’s life between the summer of 2017 and the spring of 2018, which was just chalked up to accidents.
Mr Weatherall was blown up when his burner exploded, was set up to be drowned during a fishing trip with Pollard, and an incidence of suspected poisoning.
Glenn Pollard got life with a minimum of 17 years while the other two were jailed for life with a minimum of 15 years.
Heather Pollard was seen laughing in the dock with her father before the sentence was handed down.
Jurors heard treacherous Pollard had a gun license and ‘brainwashed’ his daughter – who was Mr Weatherall’s great-niece – to fire the ‘sniper’ shot last November.
He was shot in the face at Sandwich Marina in Kent but survived when the bullet hit his right cheekbone.
Ray had been diagnosed with brain cancer in August 2015 and the following year was given only 18 months to live on to of daily insulin injections for his diabetes.