MILAN (Reuters) - The high-profile trial of the ex-wife of Italian fashion mogul Maurizio Gucci started on Tuesday but lawyers immediately launched a barrage of tactics to delay the long-awaited case. After a false start last week when defence lawyers went on strike, the session opened with a call for the chief prosecutor to stand down, a wrangle over media access to the trial and a request for another adjournment. Dozens of cameras and onlookers jostled for a first glimpse of the woman dubbed the "Black Widow", Patrizia Reggiani, who is accused of plotting the murder of her former husband Gucci in a gangland-style killing. But they were once again disappointed as she exercised her right not to attend the trial, preferring to stay in her cell in Milan's grim San Vittore prison. "Her morale and her health are very bad," said one of Reggiani's lawyers Giovanni Maria Dedola. Reggiani is taking strong epilepsy drugs after an operation to remove a brain tumour in the early 1990s, he noted. Instead, her alleged co-plotter and one-time friend Pina Auriemma, stoney-faced and dressed in a chunky-knit sweater and sunglasses in the heat of the crowded courtroom, turned up. The man who allegedly pumped three bullets into Gucci on the steps of his Milan office in March 1995, and the getaway driver sat chatting in a cage in the courtroom. The alleged go-between, hotel porter Ivano Savioni, chose to stay away. Reggiani, 50, and her alleged four accomplices, who were arrested last year after a two-year investigation, could face life behind bars if found guilty of the murder of the last grandson of Guccio Gucci, the founder of the fashion empire. The prosecution says Reggiani, obsessed with revenge following the acrimonious break-up of her marriage and infuriated over her ex-husband's plans to re-marry, plotted the murder with Auriemma who found the go-between. Reggiani denies the charges. The presiding judge turned down a request to postpone Tuesday's session due to the absence of one of Reggiani's lawyers. Calls for the prosecutor to stand down due to alleged unorthodox methods of collating evidence were also unsuccessful. The trial is expected to last up to a year with defence lawyers calling more than 100 people to testify. "This is going to be a difficult and long trial," said Paolo Antimiani, one of the hotel porter's lawyers.