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A millionaire consumed with jealousy has been jailed for eight years for trying to hire a hitman to kill her former partner and his new wife.
Carol Hunter, 50, former managing director of baby products firm Tommee Tippee, became filled with hatred after her lover of 22 years, and the father of her two children, left her for another woman.
Hunter sent a series of emails to her former partner, Colin Love, in which she referred to his new wife, Judith Love, 51, as the OBW (old bitch whore). Love married his school sweetheart after contacting her on the Friends Reunited website.
Hunter, a successful businesswoman, was told by the judge at the Old Bailey yesterday that she was callous and manipulative and had used her besotted boyfriend to help to hire a killer. Her lover, Anton Lee, was jailed for four years for soliciting murder.
Hunter, of Chiswick, west London, was found guilty at the Old Bailey in December of inciting Lee, a financial adviser, to hire a hitman to kill Colin and Judith Love. Hunter had denied the charge but pleaded guilty to soliciting grievous bodily harm with intent against Judith Love.
Lee, 54, of Stanmore, northwest London, had pleaded guilty to soliciting murder and gave evidence against Hunter.
The court was told Hunter could not accept that her 59-year-old former partner had fallen in love with someone else. The final straw came when Love, a business executive, who earned less than Hunter, wanted a share of their £600,000 ($1.7 million) home in Bedfordshire, the court was told.
As part of the plot, Lee asked a friend if he knew a contract killer. The man contacted Surrey Police, who arranged a meeting with an undercover policeman calling himself Darren. Hunter was said to have changed her mind after meeting Darren, and handed over £5000, with £5000 to follow, and said she only needed Love maimed - for her to be blinded or put in a wheelchair.
The couple was arrested in 2005 and have been in custody since. During sentencing Judge Brian Barker told the pair: "You brought disgrace on yourselves and pain and anguish to those who love you."
- Independent
