The incredible twist behind these sinister photos

The target in an alleged murder-for-hire plot has testified against her ex-partner who she says hired a hitman to kill her, and explained how a cunning police plot led to his arrest.

Meghan Verikas dated former Houston doctor Leon Jacob for more than two years but when their ended relationship in January 2017, Jacob allegedly began stalking her.

Prosecutors allege Jacob then offered two hitmen Cartier watches and $20,000 to carry out the murders of Verikas in addition to the ex-husband of his new girlfriend, Marion “Mack” McDaniel.

But the men Jacob and McDaniel were speaking to weren’t killers for hire – they were undercover operatives.

The two alleged targets cooperated with police in a bid to convince Jacob that their murders had taken place through a series of staged photos.

"I sat in a chair in a warehouse and they zip-tied my hands and my feet and put duct tape around my mouth to make me look as if I had been kidnapped," Verikas told the Harris County District court on Wednesday.

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A second photo showed Mr McDaniel laying face down on the ground, appearing to have been killed by a gunshot to the head.

After the fake hitmen told Jacob the targets were dead, police went to the high-rise apartment where he and his girlfriend Valerie McDaniel lived to deliver the news.

The officers then ended the charade, placing Jacob and McDaniel in handcuffs.

Valerie McDaniel took her own life last year.

If convicted of solicitation of capital murder, Jacob faces the possibility of life in prison.

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