Cholmondeley hawks memoirs from cell

Tom Cholmondeley (pictured in 2006), who is awaiting trial in Nairobi after shooting dead a poacher on his 50,000-acre Kenyan estate, is attempting to sell a memoir based on his experiences. According to the Daily Telegraph, Cholmondeley, 40, has approached the London literary agency William Morris with a proposal for a book, which he says will focus on the events that led up to his arrest, and, of course, the outcome of the trial.

"He has been in prison for two years now and the book has become an obsession," says one of his friends. "It is a thoughtful, intelligent story he is telling." Cholmondeley, who has spent the past two years incarcerated in Nairobi's Kamiti maximum security jail, admits shooting Robert Njoya on his family's estate in Kenya on May 10, 2006, but he argues that it was in self-defence.

But despite the fact that Cholmondeley, a 6ft 4in Old Etonian, has what publishers call a back story - his grandfather, the 4th Baron Delamere, was a pivotal figure in the wartime antics of the Happy Valley set, immortalised in the film White Mischief – the projected book has been greeted with caution in London.

Andrew Lownie, a London literary agent who was born in Kenya, says: "I wouldn't touch it unless he were to be found not guilty. There is, rightly, a distaste for seeing convicted criminals rewarded in any way for the crimes they have committed." A verdict is expected in September: Cholmondeley faces a potential death sentence.