AN "obsessed" woman who hired a hitman to kill her lover's wife has been jailed for five and a half years.

Hayley Johnston, of Brighouse, arranged to pay £10,000 to have nurse Rosalynd Johnston killed in a staged burglary last May, after a Fatal Attraction-style love triangle.

But the "hitman" was in fact an undercover detective who secretly videotaped and recorded their meetings and the phone calls.

Johnston, 43, admitted soliciting a murder when she appeared before Manchester Crown Court last October.

Sentencing her yesterday, Judge Clement Goldstone said: "This was no harebrained scheme in which your mind was overborne by fantasy.

"This was a determined effort by you. You were motivated by two factors. Firstly obsession with a man who had an unhealthy influence on your life ... and secondly, hatred for his wife."

Prosecuting barrister Rachel Smith told the court the defendant began an affair with Stuart Johnston when they were both married to other people and living in Surrey in 1997.

Mr Johnson's wife Rosalynd discovered the affair and the family tried to start afresh by moving to Wakefield in 2001.

However, Hayley Johnston also moved to the area and the affair continued.

Stuart Johnston could not choose between the two women and spent time living with the defendant. But in February, 2003, he returned to his wife and their two children, now aged 12 and 13.

Hayley Johnston, who worked at a Leeds cleaning firm, was interviewing an ex-prisoner for a job when she asked if he knew any hitmen.

He co-operated with police to introduce her to "Mac", the undercover officer.

The court watched a secretly-filmed video of Mac meeting the defendant at a service station near Leeds.

Asked how she wanted the murder carried out, she initially said: "I don't care. I just want her six feet under."

In a later meeting she was taped suggesting a staged burglary at Rosalynd Johnston's home while her husband and children were out.

When Mac telephoned her on May 19 to say he had carried out the hit, she replied: "Right, okay. All right darling. Thanks."

She was arrested later that day.

Kate Blackwell, defending, said her client had been besotted with Stuart Johnston, who damaged her self-esteem by using her financially and refusing to make a clean break of their affair.

She added that it was his suggestion that she change her name to Johnston, so they would be more like man and wife.

Ms Blackwell said: "The obsession she developed with Stuart Johnston was to be her downfall."