A traumatized father has revealed that his baby started losing clumps of hair after a vengeful neighbor injected their door with toxic chemicals.
Florida resident Umar Abdullah said Xuming Li, who has a PhD in chemistry, used a mysterious concoction to sicken his family during a month-long campaign of “torture” earlier this year.
Abdullah, 36, told DailyMail.com that the Chinese national is believed to have taken the strong opioid painkillers methadone and hydrocodone mixed with a harmful element that scientists are still trying to identify.
Li was arrested after Abdullah placed a secret camera in a plant pot outside his home on Palm Springs Boulevard, Tampa, catching him in the act.
The 36-year-old chemistry researcher was charged with possession of a controlled substance, battery assault on the homeowners and aggravated stalking.
Li was caught after the family’s father, Umar Abdullah, reported experiencing an “unpleasant odor” and difficulty breathing for more than a month until he hid a camera in a potted houseplant outside their Tampa home. (Photo: Abdullah with his daughter)
The recent University of South Florida graduate was caught on camera after the family planted a hidden lens in a houseplant outside their home
Abdullah revealed that, in addition to vomiting, dizziness and severe headaches, his family suffered from hair loss, and that in June of this year they found “tufts of hair” on their baby girl’s pillow several times.
“Our baby lost her hair,” he told DailyMail.com. “In that one month we noticed our baby’s unusual hair in the shower.
“We googled and found that babies don’t suffer from hair loss, and we also noticed our hair in the shower.
“We can’t prove it was related, but we think it was the chemicals.”
Li had attended the University of Southern Florida (USF), but Abdullah said the school “took action very quickly by imposing an expulsion sanction” after the incident.
Abdullah added that he was shocked by what his secret camera recording revealed, as Li seemed like a “common man” and even a “friendly” neighbor who often stopped to chat in the hallway.
He told DailyMail.com that Li is also a father of two young children, though he has never seen Li with the kids, despite regularly seeing his wife take them to the playground.
Li complained about the lack of sleep and hearing noise from Abdullah’s apartment
Umar Abdullah, who lives in the house, said he noticed an “unpleasant” smell and that he, his wife and baby daughter started vomiting, so he placed a camera outside.
Their relationship was rosy in August 2022 when Abdullah’s baby was born, with Li texting him to ask how his wife and newborn daughter were doing.
Abdullah told DailyMail.com that Li even knocked on their door with gifts for their daughter, and texted them to congratulate them on their “really cute girl.”
But his noise complaints started days later, when Li asked if the family could “walk more slowly” to avoid hearing their footsteps at night.
Text messages seen by the DailyMail.com show how Li regularly complained about minor noises — from the movement of the toilet seat to someone dropping their phone on the floor.
Meanwhile, Abdullah offered to buy soft shoes to lessen the impact of their footsteps, and to visit Li’s apartment so he could see for himself what it sounded like.
But tensions reached a head in March this year when Abdullah’s family visited, and Li called the police within 15 minutes of their arrival, complaining about the sound of their luggage scraping the floor.
Neighbor from hell Xuming Li is said to have contaminated the door of a family in Florida with so much “chemical” that it made their baby sick. They hid a camera outside their home in Tampa and caught it in the act (pictured)
Abdullah’s hidden camera footage showed Li appearing to take out a syringe, fill it with clear liquid, and inject it into the slit in Abdullah’s door frame.
Three months later, Li sought revenge by planting a harmful mixture of chemicals at the family’s front door while they were away to a conference in Ohio.
When they returned in early June, they were plagued by an ‘unpleasant’ smell and soon began to feel nauseated and lose tufts of hair.
Abdullah thought the smell was coming from his air conditioner or his water heater, but plumbers and officials who investigated found no problems.
His landlord even replaced the heating and had his air ducts and vents cleaned, but the chemical smell remained.
Desperate to find out what was plaguing his family, Abdullah called the fire department who sent a Hazmat team, but their tests turned up nothing.
“I was sniffing like a dog,” he said.
The sniff test led him to his doorway, where he discovered a small crack in the corner.
Now only beginning to suspect that some form of tampering had taken place, Abdullah placed a hidden camera in a potted plant outside his door.
The footage showed Li, dressed in casual sweatpants, squatting and appearing to place something under their door
His daughter fell ill again, prompting Abdullah to watch the footage – and he was shocked by what he saw.
“We were shaking,” he said. “We can’t imagine him doing anything.”
The footage showed Li, dressed in casual sweatpants, squatting and appearing to place something under their door.
Shocked, Abdullah adjusted the camera angle from door level to eye level to capture what Li had been doing in recent moments.
This time, his footage appeared to show Li taking out a syringe, filling it with clear liquid, and injecting it into the slit in Abdullah’s door frame.
The terrified father immediately took his family out of the house and called the police.
He panicked and rushed his family to the hospital – an experience he described in his victim impact statement for a hearing against Li at the USF, resulting in his expulsion.
“My heart was racing and my head felt like it was spinning,” he said in the statement for DailyMail.com to see.
“My wife and I rushed to the emergency room, holding our precious daughter, fearing the worst.
“We were shaking,” Abdullah told WFLA. “We can’t imagine him coming to do anything”
“Seeing her tiny hand with an intravenous catheter, as I endured those painful jabs and tests, I was torn inside.
Her innocent face, contorted with pain and anguish, filled my soul with unbearable anguish.
“All because of that heartless criminal, Mr. Xuming Li, whose actions had brought so much misery to our little angel.
My eyes filled with tears as I held my daughter close to me and prayed for her safety.
“The thought that she would have to bear this suffering because of someone’s sinister deeds was too much.”
Abdullah said he was relieved that the tests showed “nothing critical,” but his doctor advised his family to inform all their future counselors about the incident in case they experience “elevated platelet counts and potential long-term effects.”
“We are still living in a constant trauma, haunted by the memories of that terrible day,” Abdullah said.
“Now, after a month, almost every other day, we are still cleaning the door and disinfecting it with disinfectant, hoping to get rid of the poison that the monster injected us to inhale.
“Since the incident, we have lost our sense of security and can no longer leave our house alone.
“My wife and daughter used to enjoy their mornings when I worked, but now they’re paralyzed with fear and afraid to venture out on their own.”