UK- A PORN actress encouraged her disabled husband to kill himself because she wanted his money, a court was told yesterday.

Gemma Johnson, 21, whose estranged husband James Edwards, 38, was the producer, director and co-star of her films, is accused of feeding him Paracetamol and then, when that failed to kill him, trying to help him to hang himself from his bathroom door.

The couple married in February 2003 but by August the marriage had broken down.

Edwards admitted to causing Ms Johnson grievous bodily harm after pouring a kettle of boiling water over her when she tried to leave him and is awaiting sentencing.

Edwards, who suffers from spina bifida, told the court that at the time of the suicide attempt he had wanted to die and his wife had promised to help him if he left his entire estate to her. But he said that his wife became angry that the attempt had failed because she had wasted a day off work.

Ms Johnson, who met Edwards when she was 14, stood to inherit his fortune, which included a £300,000 house, two life insurance policies worth £400,000, and £80,000 in cash after he changed his will. Andrew McFarlane, for the prosecution, told Bristol Crown Court that the case was not about mercy killing but had “far more sinister connotations”.

He said: “Mercy was not in the forefront of the defendant’s mind . . . the offence was committed for personal greed.”

Edwards told the court that three days before the suicide attempt at his home in Bristol December last year, Ms Johnson sent him a text message saying: “Why don’t you get on with it? It would make a lot of people happier. You’ve made a lot of people’s lives hell over the last few months.”

Edwards said: “I was very upset and depressed because I loved Gemma very much. I was sad the relationship had ended. I felt it was better for Gemma if I wasn’t about. She agreed.”

The court was told that Ms Johnson brought Edwards Paracetamol capsules which she fed him one by one washed down with sips of cranberry juice and tea.

Edwards said Johnson “wasn’t impressed” when he began to feel sick after he had swallowed about a couple of dozen of the pills.

Edwards said: “She was getting a bit frustrated because I was taking quite a long time, so she tried to help me try to hang myself.”

Ms Johnson allegedly left him hanging from the door by his dressing gown cord. He was found by his mother and taken to hospital.

Edwards said that Miss Johnson became angry when she visited him in hospital because he had divulged that she had bought the Paracetamol and been there when he tried to kill himself.

He told the jury she stormed off after a five-minute visit. The court was told that a nurse had taken a note of the conversation and reported it. Ms Johnson was later arrested.

Ms Johnson pleaded not guilty to aiding and abetting Edwards’s suicide attempt.

Jenny Tallentire, for the defence, said that Edwards had tried to commit suicide on three previous occasions.

The trial continues.