Last week’s verdict of a US court ordering Pragnesh Desai, an NRI businessman from Vadodara, to pay $ 4 million in compensation for the wrongful death of his fiancee Leona Swiderski, could change the course of the case in India, say investigators.Desai and his accomplice, childhood friend Vipul Patel, allegedly hired an assassin to kill the model on a visit to India in order to obtain insurance money.The Thane Sessions Court had acquitted the two on September 2003 and granted them bail. The police had then appealed in the Bombay High Court. It was after this acquittal that the Swiderskis had filed a civil suit in Newark, New Jersey, seeking compensation and punitive damages. Thane Superintendent of Police Ramrao Pawar, who investigated the case, said the trial in high court would begin soon.‘‘The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the US police authorities are also keeping in touch with us,’’ he said. ‘‘The Thane verdict has been sent, and I believe there is still a strong case for the two to be prosecuted.’’Both Desai and Patel continue to be out of jail. Desai’s house, off R V Desai Road in the city, remains locked. His mother Leela left for the US about nine months ago. And members of Patel’s family, which lives in the Karelibaug area, say they don’t know where he is.Advocate Maulik Nanavati, who fought Desai’s extradition case in Delhi, said: ‘‘As of today, Desai stands acquitted of all charges. We maintain that the appeal against the (Thane court) verdict by the Maharashtra Government is mala fide and owing to reasons extraneous to the case. So far as extradition is concerned, he can’t be tried twice for the same offence.”Nanavati said Desai was very much in Vadodara. Desai, 40, owns two restaurants in New York — Bukhara in Manhattan and 7 Eleven in Cliffside Park. He lived in New Jersey. He met Swiderski in 2000, they dated for three years, and decided to get married. The police had charged Desai and Patel with conspiring to murder Swiderski on her arrival in India so that Desai could collect $ 1 million in life insurance, which he had taken out in her name before her death.According to prosecution, the plan to kill Swiderski had been conceived by Desai around January 14, 2003, while he and Swiderski were staying at a friend’s place. Desai met with Patel and agreed to pay him Rs 30 lakh for killing Swiderski.After returning to the US on January 17, 2003, Desai allegedly bought cover money on two $ 500,000 policies, one from New York Life Insurance Co. and another from Banner Life Insurance Co.He came to India with his fiancee on Air India Flight 144 from Newark on February 8, 2003, on the pretext of purchasing clothes for their marriage. Patel and two others allegedly received the two in a blue Cielo car at Sahar International Airport. Shortly after leaving the airport, one of the passengers strangled Swiderski in the back seat. Desai was then dropped at the international arrival area, where he lodged a missing person complaint at the airport police station. Leona’s body was thrown in the bushes by the side of the road in a secluded area on National Highway No. 8 near Versova.Desai and Patel were arrested in India on February 13, 2003.
