CLAD in black and clutching her war hero husband’s medals, Christina Schmid became the poster girl of bravery for the men and women who sacrificed themselves in the War on Terror.
But last October, 15 years after losing her husband Olaf in Afghanistan, the war widow was found guilty of a tirade of abuse towards her new partner, Adam Plumb, who, for the first time, has shared harrowing footage of her “booze-fuelled rage” with the public.
He reveals the extent of the abuse he suffered at the hands of Christina, who he claims “fooled the nation” and went on to sell her late husband’s war medal.
Property developer Adam Plumb, 44, had his own lucrative business and thought he had met his perfect partner when he fell for the high-profile war pension campaigner Christina Schmid.
Adam, then a divorced father-of-one, met Christina, 50, in late 2018 when he took his springer spaniels to her dog-grooming salon in Dorset.
Things progressed quickly and, despite Adam’s last-minute attempts to cancel the wedding, the pair married at an intimate ceremony at Bovey Castle, Devon, in October 2020.
After claiming the £16k engagement ring he bought was “not enough” for Christina, he went on to buy a £1.5million mansion for his wife the following year.
Adam believed the purchase was the beginning of a bright new future for the couple, but he quickly found himself trapped in a “nightmare” of abuse that left him bankrupt and booted out of their dream home.
He told The Sun: “What I don’t understand is that Christina could have divorced me and we could have walked away with £800k each – but she wanted to destroy everything.
“There was no reason to want to destroy and ruin me; it was to her own detriment.
“She would just say and do anything to fit in with any situation, so you never really knew what was genuine or who she was. She not only fooled me, but she fooled the nation.”
Christina, whose army husband died defusing a Taliban bomb in 2009, went on to become the face of the war widows of the Afghanistan conflict and met royalty and senior politicians as part of her campaigning.
She campaigned for better Army pay and pensions and received his George Cross from the late Queen.
But her reputation was left in tatters when she was handed a 12-week suspended sentence for hitting, kicking and biting her second husband, Adam – as well as his teenage daughter – at their home.
Adam, who is currently finalising a divorce from Christina, said after the case he wanted to release the shocking footage to show everyone what his wife was “really like”.
She cut her own nose with her fingernail and blew it on my t-shirt
Adam Plumb
In the videos, which were shown in court, Schmid is seen poking and grabbing Adam while shouting in a “booze-fuelled rage”.
She is shown cutting her nose with her own nail and blowing the blood into Adam’s t-shirt, before falsely accusing him of attacking her.
Speaking on the incident, which was filmed on September 17, 2023, and led to her conviction, Adam described Christina attacking him “like a relentless dog”.
He said: “She was kicking and scratching me in bed and poking her nails into my back. I tried to escape to the walk-in-wardrobe, and she came in and cut her own nose with her fingernail and blew it on my t-shirt.
“She accuses me of biting her, but just keeps hitting, scratching and then bites me in the back. It is horrible, vile behaviour.
“I could not get her away from me and was trapped in the corner. It was relentless – like a dog coming at you… You can’t get them off.”
In harrowing footage of their blazing row, Christina’s daughter is seen filming – with Adam exclaiming “you’ve got your daughter you to film you, you are sick”.
‘Left with nothing’
Adam told how he had suffered abuse for a number of years in the build-up to the attack, with incidents including Christina not letting him into the house after work and forcing him to sleep in laybys and Airbnbs.
Police were called on five occasions after he reported abuse – but each time Christina would throw the same accusations back at him.
Adam says his daughter, now 19, then phoned the police, while Christina continued to hit and scratch him. When police arrived, she then accused him of assault.
As a result, social services spent four months investigating Adam over his wife’s abuse claims without speaking to him.
He said “a lot of people” had believed the false accusations that he was an abuser, and he said this had “ruined his life.”
Adam continued: “I felt embarrassed to go out. I was left to sleep in the car, campsites and Airbnbs.
“All the people I worked for and invested in me thought I was an abuser.
“She was spreading that message to everyone.”
Adam said that since Christina had him arrested for false allegations, he has never been back to the house.
I felt embarrassed to go out. I was left to sleep in the car, campsites and Airbnbs.
Adam Plumb
He explained his wife was even granted an occupation order – a court injunction preventing him from living in the family home – and she has since built up large mortgage arrears.
He added: “I was promised I’d be looked after, but have been left with nothing.
“She somehow got an occupation order despite being charged and convicted of assaulting my daughter and me, and has sold everything – including £60k worth of my tools.”
He revealed he was even made bankrupt over an £8k debt to a school that he had planned to pay back before the next hearing.
But Adam claims Christina hid the letter and bragged to her friends that he ‘wouldn’t be attending’.
He added: “I left my marriage with just the clothes and shoes I got arrested in, I was never allowed back to get anything from my life, it was all stolen, sold and destroyed
“The house that was meant to be our dream home is now £96k in arrears on the mortgage, so the home is going to get repossessed at some point in the near future.
“I had a carpentry company with a business partner that had a turnover of £2.5M. We went our separate ways, and I started getting into property development.
“I had started work on a barn conversion in Devon, and she told the bank I was money laundering and that I had beaten her up and abused her.
“I had given everything in my life to put into that site to make something bigger – but they called in my loans, and the bank now owns it.”
‘It’s all too late’
Adam added: “Police came to the house five times when she was attacking me. Each time, she threatened to spread lies and destroy me. The police were not supportive of me despite her attacking me.
“The only reason it stopped was what happened on 17 September. After that, the police told me they were going to protect me.
“But I was failed at every step. You can see why men don’t get help and give up.”
Adam told how he went from “place to place” for two years and didn’t want to get into another relationship, but he has now met a new partner.
He says he’s now trying to move on and said Christina’s exposure in the court had been a relief.
He added: “I am pleased the truth has been seen and she was held accountable, but it is such a small percentage of what she has put us through.
“It is all too late for us. She is still in the house and doing what she wants, slandering my name with false accusations.
“I just feel such utter disgust for what she did. She is a horrible, horrible woman and has ruined my entire life.”
