Computer expert `hired hitman to kill love rival'

By Shenai Raif

A COMPUTER expert earning pounds 100,000 a year with the oil giant BP offered a hitman pounds 5,000 to kill her "love rival", the Old Bailey was told yesterday.

Hansa Kava, 37, then spent two days in a health farm while she waited for Inthu Velami to be "bumped off", said John Bevan QC, for the prosecution. But Ms Kava was arrested when she arrived home after being trapped by an undercover policeman posing as the would-be killer, he said.

Ms Kava, of Ruislip, west London, pleaded not guilty to soliciting "Nilo", the undercover officer, to kill Mrs Velami in September last year.

Mr Bevan said Ms Kava had become obsessed with Mrs Velami's husband, Suresh, when they had worked together in the computer department of another company. All three had been friends but, about five years ago, Ms Kava's feelings towards Mr Velami, 35, with whom she claimed to have had an affair, "deteriorated into obsessive jealousy". She stalked Mrs Velami and, after the couple married in 1997, she allegedly decided to have her killed.

As she continued to stalk the couple in her sports car, the court was told, Ms Kava approached a car mechanic whom she thought would have underworld contacts. But he warned the couple and went to the police. She also approached another man who thought she was "crazy" and told the Velamis.

An undercover policeman with a hidden tape recorder met Ms Kava in the car park of a branch of Toys R Us, and she promised him pounds 5,000 she had borrowed from a friend. She was then alleged to have booked into a health farm for two days while she waited for news of Mrs Velami's death.

When she was arrested, Ms Kava claimed she had been talking to the men about a car deal and had considered the threats of violence as a joke.

Mr Velami denied there had been a sexual relationship between Ms Kava and himself. He told the court that she once lured him to a hotel near Heathrow Airport by threatening suicide. He said: "She implied she wanted more of the relationship. I was not interested but I was concerned about her welfare."

He said when he went to leave, she called the police and claimed that he had attacked her. He was allowed to leave when the allegation was not repeated.

The case was adjourned until Monday.