A man who told police about an apparent hitman plot said he knew the situation was serious when he was offered $30,000 to kill the intended victim.
The man, whose identity has been suppressed, gave the testimony in the first day of the trial of Brian Vincent Attwell, 73, who has been charged with the rare offence of attempting to procure the commission of a crime.
In his opening address to the Albany Courthouse on Western Australia's southern coast on Monday, state prosecutor James MacTaggart said the well-known local businessman was approached by a Kiwi truck driver who desperately wanted work and hoped Attwell could offer him employment.
The man was shocked after Attwell allegedly offered him $30,000 to kill Michelle Patreena Attwell, who the AD Contractors managing director despised intensely.
"I've got $30,000 to pay you right now. I want her gone," it is claimed Attwell said.
Alarmed, the truck driver told police, who called Attwell back on police instruction, saying he knew "a bit of a nasty bastard" who would do it.
At first, he thought Attwell's proposal may have been an integrity test, but things got serious when talk turned to money.
"He wasn't joking - he looked me straight in the eye," the man said.
"When he offered me $30,000, that's when everyone changed."
Asked by defence lawyer Tom Percy whether he made the allegation because he was angry the interview process had taken an unwelcome turn, the man said no.
"I went there for a job - not to be offered to murder someone," he said.
Attwell, who is frail and barely mobile, was then called by an undercover policeman who agreed to fly to Albany from Perth to discuss the deal.
They met twice, and the policeman was handed a $10,000 down payment on the hit in two instalments.
Atwell called his target foul names, saying she had cost his son Ian $200,000 in a bitter marriage breakdown.
"I just want her strangled, no blood," Attwell allegedly said.
The intended victim briefly took the stand, saying the accused had made a threatening phone call to her in September 2011.
"If he saw me walking down the street, he would run over me, he would take me out," she said.
But Mr Percy described his client's talks with the truck driver and undercover officer as "bravado and puff, an attempt to express the depth of his frustration".
It was no secret Attwell hated the woman, but was considering having her followed, perhaps scared, he said.
And the undercover police officer had never been given a detailed description of her, where to find her or a time to kill her.
"At no stage was he actually committed to the prospect of causing her physical harm, let alone killing her," Mr Percy said.
"Nothing was ever concluded. There was a long way to go."
The trial continues.
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