Alabama woman’s severe lead poisoning leads to husband’s arrest on attempted murder charges

In January 2022, Hannah Pettey was rushed to UAB Hospital after a seizure and severe weakness left her unable to care for her young children. Hospital tests revealed an extraordinary amount of lead in her colon, bones and bloodstream, leading physicians to state the poisoning appeared deliberate. Law enforcement, alerted by the medical team, began an inquiry that quickly centered on her husband, Brian Mann, a chiropractor who had provided her with nightly supplement capsules.

The Department of Human Resources was notified, and the case was escalated to a grand jury, which in September 2022 authorized Mann’s arrest on an attempted murder charge. He was released on a $500,000 bond and required to report to jail each weekend. Despite extensive searches of the couple’s home and the chiropractor’s office, investigators have not yet located the source of the lead, and the case remains open.