Iris Amsel expected a payment after a business relationship with her ex-husband ended, but she never got it and hired Maria Mitousis as her lawyer in 2010, the trial of accused letter bomber Guido Amsel heard on Tuesday.

Iris testified there was “a game plan” to try and get the money, but court heard it triggered a long, legal battle.

“He counter-sued me,” Iris testified.

Iris told court a judge was supposed to rule on the case in September 2015.

In July 2015, Mitousis was seriously injured when a mail bomb detonated at her law office.

Letter bombs were also discovered at a second law office and Iris’s workplace but were neutralized by police.  Court has also heard evidence about a 2013 explosion at Iris Amsel’s home.

The trial heard Guido and Iris got married in Germany in 1988.  Guido served in the Germany military prior to the marriage, Iris told court.

She testified the couple immigrated to Canada in 1991 and eventually built a home together in the R.M. of St. Clements where Iris now lives following the couple’s divorce.

Iris explained in court she and Guido started an automotive business together in Winnipeg which had three different locations, including its most recent address on Springfield Road.

She told court their divorce was finalized in August 2004 and that through the divorce “I became 50 per cent owner” of the business, but that they no longer lived together at their R.M. of St. Clements home after the divorce.

“He moved out basically right away,” Iris testified.  “My parents gave him the money for me to be able to stay in the house.”

Iris told court after the divorce, “he went on the internet to find the person he could marry.”

She told court they remained business partners until 2007 at which time they agreed to part ways.

“We made a decision that the company would be 100 per cent his,” Iris testified.

Iris told court Guido gave her $100,000 but that he still owed her a further $40,000 plus half of the equipment -- logging equipment, cranes, backhoes and dozers -- the couple had acquired over the years.

In 2007, Iris testified Guido became full owner of the automotive business but she took over a second automotive company the couple operated together, becoming its sole owner.

“Did any of them ever succeed or make money,” Crown attorney Chris Vanderhooft asked Iris.

“None,” Iris testified.

“Were you making millions of dollars for example?”

“No.”

Court has previously heard Amsel filed a complaint with RCMP over millions of dollars which had been taken from him.

Iris testified she was running her company out of a building on the same property as Guido’s but in 2009 she left.

“He forced me out,” Iris told court.  “He did not want me on the property.”

Iris told court it was because “when he met his current wife…I pretended to be someone on the internet who I was not.”

“Friends had told him about it.”

Defence presses Iris Amsel on online impersonation

Under cross-examination Iris denied trying to destroy Guido’s relationship with his new wife but she did testify that she created a fake online profile.

Amsel’s lawyers suggested she was pretending to be a man showing interest in Guido’s new wife.

“You’d agree with me you tried to impact the relationship by creating a fake profile,” asked Amsel’s lawyer Saheel Zaman.

“I initially was,” Iris replied.

“Who did you pretend to be?”

“A guy.”

Zaman suggested Iris was responsible for sending the letter bombs and for the 2013 explosion outside her own home as a way to get revenge on Guido.

“I’m going to suggest you pretended you didn’t hear anything because it was you that planted that bomb,” said Zaman.

“That is not correct,” Iris testified.

“I’m going to suggest you sent the bomb to Maria Mitousis’s office in early July.”

“That is not correct.”

Guido Amsel has pleaded not guilty to five counts of attempted murder and several explosives-related charges.