DAVID KELLY’S widow is preparing to sue the Ministry of Defence for compensation for her husband’s suicide.

Janice Kelly, 58, is consulting her legal team to decide what action she can take to defend her late husband’s memory after the Hutton report. Her lawyers are considering whether to sue the MoD for the loss of her husband, his salary as a government scientist and possible future earnings.

Last night, officials said that they expected a writ. An MoD spokesman said: “If Mrs Kelly and her family wish to make a claim for compensation, then obviously we will address that. We will have to wait and see.”

Lawyers for the family said that Mrs Kelly plans to spend the next few days carefully studying the report at her cottage in Southmoor, Oxfordshire, under police guard, before making a decision. “Nothing has been ruled in or out,” a spokeswoman for Mrs Kelly’s lawyers said. The MoD was criticised by Lord Hutton for failing to warn Dr Kelly of the agreed Whitehall procedure under which his name might become public. But legal experts said last night that this may not be enough to form the basis of a claim.

One lawyer, who specialises in claims against the MoD, said: “It would have to be a stress at work claim. The MoD knew he was under stress but I think they could argue that the source of the stress was something unauthorised, that he was not acting under the scope of his employment.”

Mrs Kelly may decide instead to make a public statement to counter Lord Hutton’s conclusion that her husband’s meeting with Andrew Gilligan was “unauthorised”. The family are known to dispute this finding from their last-minute submissions to Lord Hutton.

Mrs Kelly has already been offered an estimated £750,000 for her story. But a source close to the family said she has a “deep antipathy” to the media and is unlikely to accept payment from a newspaper. But it emerged yesterday that she had written a letter about her ordeal to the newsletter of her local historical society, of which she was chairman.

She wrote of how the police broke the news of her husband’s death: “ ‘There is no easy way to tell you this . . .’ — These have been the most terrible words I have ever heard. Back in July, the nightmare which my family had become involved in since we began to realise there was something wrong really took on a momentum of its own, as a police officer came to tell us the awful news. What started as a private family problem became, in the blink of an eye, an international storm of dreadful proportions.”

Mrs Kelly paid tribute to friends and neighbours, saying that one had arrived at the height of her troubles with “a huge chocolate cake”, and to strangers who had written hundreds of letters, some even addressed to “Mrs Kelly, c/o 10 Downing Street”. She wrote: “David had always planned to come along to the History Society regularly after he retired, as his schedule for the work he was so hugely engrossed in did not allow much leisure time. He would have been perplexed, equally, by the eulogies and by the hard words which have been uttered about him since his death.”

The Kelly family are now facing another month of anguish as they wait to hear whether there will be a full inquest into Dr Kelly’s death.

Nicholas Gardiner, the Oxfordshire Coroner, said he was studying Lord Hutton’s report and other documents that were never shown to the law lord before making his decision. The coroner will make a formal announcement of his decision in court but for legal reasons this will not be until 28 days after the publication of Lord Hutton’s report.

Police interviewed 500 people, took 300 witness statements and seized more than 700 documents in their investigation into Dr Kelly’s death, but fewer than 70 statements were given to Lord Hutton.

At least five witnesses, including Mai Pederson, the American linguist who introduced Dr Kelly to the Baha’i faith and was a close friend, refused to let their statements be seen by the inquiry.

Ms Pederson told a Sunday newspaper last week that she believed that Dr Kelly was murdered, but Lord Hutton was never told. She said: “His job was dangerous. He knew it could cost him his life. He got death threats.”

Mr Gardiner has ordered police to hand over Ms Pederson’s statement. He will now decide whether it sheds fresh light on the circumstances surrounding Dr Kelly’s death.

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