Mention of Pacheco's live-in partner Viola Fernandes as his "wife" in a newspaper advertisement seemed to have angered his female friend Nadia Torrado and led her to commit suicide, Pacheco's lawyer said.
Mention of former Goa minister Francisco Pacheco's live-in partner Viola Fernandes as his "wife" in a newspaper advertisement seemed to have angered his female friend Nadia Torrado and led her to commit suicide, Pacheco's lawyer told a court here today.
Nadia, 28, showed "suicidal tendencies" and she tried to end her life when she was 15, a fact mentioned in the records at Mumbai's Jupiter Hospital (where she was taken for treatment after consuming poison on May 15), the defence lawyer told the sessions court.
The 46-year-old NCP legislator is in judicial custody in connection with Torrado's death after allegedly consuming poison in May. He has been booked by the police on the charge of abetment to suicide and culpable homicide not amounting to murder.
"On May 14, there was an advertisement about a drama scheduled in Benaulim constituency (represented by Pacheco) in
which Viola Fernandes was named as wife of Pacheco and the
chief guest at the event. This might have irked Nadia," said
Surendra Desai, lawyer defending the former Tourism Minister.
Pacheco, fighting a divorce petition against his wife Sara, is in a live-in relationship with Viola since 2004. The NCP leader has described Torrado, who had filed for separation with her husband Wilson Barretto, as his "close friend".
"Nadia was presenting herself as Pacheco's wife. That was evident from an airlines tag found at her house which read her identity as wife of tourism minister," Desai said.
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