A Tasmanian woman who was allegedly set on fire by her partner has told a jury how he threatened to kill her — and force her to write her own suicide note beforehand — if she ever left him
The 24-year-old woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, is giving evidence in a Supreme Court trial in Hobart, where her former partner is charged with attempted murder.
The Crown alleges that in April 2017 she and her partner entered a shed on a property at Chigwell, north of Hobart, and got into an argument.
"We were both hitting one another. Things ended up on the ground. We were basic rolling around on top of one another hitting each other," she told the court.
She told the jury she wanted to leave, but he wouldn't let her.
"I turned my back to [him] and I felt a splash go over mostly my left side of what I knew was petrol because of the smell," she said.
The woman told the court she agreed to go inside his house and get changed out of the petrol soaked clothes.
"When I was getting closer to [him] all I remember is a lighter being flicked by him," she said.
"I thought I was going to die in the garage. I thought it was going to explode," she said.
"I remember [him] struggling to get [the door] open … [next thing] I was running around the backyard yelling for help. After that I woke up to [him] being next to me."
She told the court when she woke up the flames had been put out and he was trying to "cradle" her.
"[He] had said to me that he was going to go to jail for a very very long time if I don't say that it was a soldering accident," she said.
She told the court that she remembered the man being in the ambulance with her, telling her he loved her.
The woman would spend three months at the Alfred and then another two in rehab.
"The only parts of my body that aren't burnt are my feet, right hand and right forearm. Some of my face. But I still had superficial burns to my face," she told the court.
While she was in rehab she received a call from the man. He told her she had done it to herself.
The defence is asking the jury to consider whether it was a suicide attempt gone wrong.
Video calls to check up on her, jury told
The pair met in late 2015.
"At the beginning it was good and fun and happy," she told the court.
But she said everything changed when she moved in with him, about three months into their relationship.
"He became controlling by monitoring my phone, my social media, [asking] where I was going, who I was spending time with," she said.
"[He thought I was] being unfaithful to him, cheating on him.
She told the jury he would "constantly" call her to check up. Sometimes they were video calls — where she would have to show him around the room so he could see that she was alone or what she was doing.
If he did not want her going anywhere, he would disconnect parts of her car so she couldn't drive, she told the court.
"He would take the battery out of my car, he would take my keys from me, he would disconnect certain things under the bonnet so I couldn't start the car, or he'd park it somewhere where I couldn't get it out," she told the jury.
She described her relationship with the man as "controlling and violent" and said whenever she told him she wanted to leave he would say she was not going anywhere.
'I can't escape, I can't get away'
The court heard that on numerous occasions the man threatened to kill her if she left him. There were two she remembered clearly.
"[He said] he'd throw me to pigs. Take me to a pig farm and throw me in there," she said.
"On the second occasion he said he would hang me, but make it look like a suicide.
In 2016 the man spent a number of months in custody, the court heard.
During that time they continued their relationship, but the woman said she was worried he would "bring [her] down again" when he got out.
"I had moved into my own place and I was working and doing well for myself. I was just hoping that [he] wasn't going to bring me down again," she told the jury.
The month before he got out, she wrote a letter and hid it in her make-up box, writing: "I don't have answers … I can't escape, I can't get away."
"I wrote the letter because I was expecting something to go wrong," she told the jury.
By April 2017, the month of the alleged incident, she had lost "a fair bit of weight" weighing between 46kg and 48kg, she told the court.
"Something happened with my hair that was causing it to fall out and I had bald patches everywhere.
"I was mentally drained. I was constantly upset. Felt worthless. I was always angry."
The trial is continuing.
