Murder planned through secret notes - Crown

Amandeep Kaur. Photo / Richard Robinson

A couple having an affair planned, through a series of secret notes, to murder the woman's husband the Crown says.

Gurjinder Singh, 27, and Amandeep Kaur, 32, are on trial in the High Court at Auckland over the alleged murder of 35-year-old Davender Singh - Kaur's husband at the time.

The victim was stabbed more than a dozen times while parked on a Papatoetoe street in August last year and bled to death there after his throat was slit.

Crown prosecutor Natalie Walker said the 12-centimetre wound partially cut Davender Singh's windpipe, his jugular vein and nicked his carotid artery.

She detailed for the jury the background to the love triangle that she said ended in the defendants plotting and executing the bloody killing.

Davinder Singh (left) and his wife, Amandeep Kaur. Photo / Supplied

Kaur and Gurjinder Singh worked together at Sistema Plastics in Penrose and began an affair several months before the incident.

The jury would be shown evidence of more than 150 calls and 1000 text messages shared between the pair between May and July.

But they were eventually rumbled.

Once their respective partners found out, the electronic contact stopped but Ms Walker said their communications continued in the form of hand-written notes.

Most importantly, the Crown said the plan to murder Davender Singh was clearly apparent through them.

Ms Walker read numerous excerpts, through which the defendants discussed being together and committing the crime being the only way to make that happen.

On August 7, Davender Singh picked Kaur up from work and stopped on Norman Lesser Drive near the Manukau Events Centre.

CCTV would show the car pull up, Ms Walker said, followed minutes later by that of Gurjinder Singh.

About 12 minutes after that, the Crown said the defendant could be seen walking back to his vehicle and driving away.

Meanwhile, it is alleged Kaur waited a couple of minutes before calling for help - and rather phone the police she first spoke to a relative.

During an initial interview she said a stranger had demanded money and stabbed her husband.

That would be the first of many lies, Ms Walker said.

Eventually she named her co-accused as the attacker but denied any role in planning it.

Almost 24 hours after the killing, Gurjinder Singh was also being questioned and made similar denials until police revealed more about what they knew.

Eventually the couple - warned that what they were saying could be used as evidence - were allowed to speak to each other.

Ms Walker said initially they offered to take the blame but by the end were pointing the finger at each other.

Gurjinder Singh said Kaur had struck the first blow and said she held her husband's hands down at one stage.

"Both were knowingly involved in the murder," Ms Walker said.

The Crown said a knife - shown to the jury in a plastic case - was found at Gurjinder Singh's house, covered in both his DNA and the blood of the victim.

It is alleged the weapon was wrapped in a towel with some blood-soaked clothes and hidden under a tarpaulin in the defendant's garage.

The trial, before Justice Graham Lang and a jury of nine men and three women, is scheduled to last four weeks.