Samantha Fraser's birthday was supposed to represent the beginning of a wonderful new stage of her life after escaping the control and violence of her estranged husband.
She was petrified of Adrian James Basham, but the courageous and fiercely loving mother-of-three was feeling strong about giving evidence in court against him over allegations he raped her throughout their 10-year-marriage.
On July 23, 2018 he murdered her to stop that happening. And then he staged her death to look like a suicide.
Basham, 46, was jailed for life on Monday by Victorian Supreme Court Justice Lesley Taylor. He must serve at least 30 years before any chance of parole.
A day after celebrating her birthday and a new beginning with a small gathering of family Ms Fraser drove her children, then aged five, seven and nine, to school.
She headed to her Cowes home on Phillip Island. She had changed the locks on the doors and windows, re-coded the garage door remote and her parents had moved in. Basham had been spotted on the island in recent days and she was being extra vigilant.
For two-and-a-half hours Basham had been lying in wait for her to return.
Inside the garage he savagely beat her, leaving 41 separate injuries. He admits that.
He then tied a noose around her neck and hanged her from the garage door, staging her death as a suicide. Even after a jury found him guilty of murder, he maintains that Ms Fraser took her own life.
"By any measure, your offending was extremely grave. You invaded the legal and physical sanctity of Ms Fraser's home and subjected her to a savage beating before hanging her," Justice Taylor said.
"Her last conscious moments would have passed in terror."
Her family and friends clapped as Basham was led from court after the sentencing.
Ms Fraser and Basham met in 2005 and married in 2007. After years of domineering and controlling behaviour she left the relationship in 2017 and in August that year Basham was charged with raping her throughout their marriage.
Ms Fraser was due to give evidence against him in court on July 30, 2018. She had told a friend she was feeling strong and determined to have her voice heard.
Basham's premeditated murder of Ms Fraser, motivated by his desire to avoid standing trial for rape, was selfish in the extreme and displayed an extraordinary degree of entitlement, Justice Taylor said.
"Your decision to execute Samantha Fraser, a woman who had found the courage to defy you, keep your children safe from you and live a life free from you, was cold.
"You determined that her life was expendable ... (and) you had the arrogance to think you would not be caught."
She found Basham was "unmoved" in the face of numerous statements detailing the pain he had caused his own children by killing their mother.
Now a teen, her eldest daughter said nothing would compare to the damage Basham had done to her and her family's lives.
"He murdered my mum. He took Sammy's life and in doing so destroyed so many others."
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