Care worker jailed for hitman plot

10 June 2008 02:35pm

A care worker has been jailed for seven years for taking out a home-improvements loan to pay a hitman to kill her husband.

Zoe Kenealy, 44, of Kenley, Surrey, was found guilty at the Old Bailey in April of soliciting murder.

Her husband Timothy put his head in his hands as he heard Judge Gregory Stone call Kenealy's plot "cynical and cruel".

Mr Kenealy, a 51-year-old catering worker, has said he would stand by his wife and forgive her.

Judge Stone praised Kenealy's family, particularly her father, for giving her up to police after learning of her plans.

The court was told that Kenealy took out a £4,500 loan because she wanted her husband dead in order to collect a £33,000 insurance policy.

She had been in a violent relationship with her first husband, and said she felt smothered by Mr Kenealy and that they had financial problems.

She had two young sons by Mr Kenealy and four other children from her first marriage.

Simon Wild, prosecuting, said she gave neighbour Lee Waite, 31, £3,000 to hire someone for the hit but he pocketed the money. She was arrested in January 2007 after members of the family called in police.

Nicholas Atkinson QC, defending, told the judge: "This is a desperately sad woman. She found her husband difficult to cope with."

© The Press Association