A woman burned her husband alive in an armchair by pouring a jerry can of petrol on him and setting it alight during a wild argument that started at an engagement party.
Former Tupperware saleswoman Angela Surtees, 34, of Geelong, pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the Supreme Court of Victoria on Friday after a murder charge was sensationally dropped.
The matter had been listed to go to trial up until just a few days ago when Victoria’s Director of Public Prosecutions Kerri Judd, QC offered Surtees a plea deal.
Angela Surtees (pictured) worked as a Tupperware lady before she set her husband on fire as he sat on a couch outside their front door
Police were called to the couple’s Boundary Road home around 8.30pm where they found the father with severe burns. Pictured above are the charred remains of the armchair where Mr Surtees was sitting
The pair, who were married for four years with five children, had been reportedly involved in a ‘petty argument’ before Mr Surtees’ death
Justice Andrew Tinney, who was a top prosecutor in his day, appeared shocked by the move on Thursday.
The court heard Surtees had admitted to dousing her husband Daniel in petrol and igniting a lighter as he relaxed in a chair on the porch of their Geelong home in January last year.
The father of five – two with Surtees – was engulfed in flames as he was incinerated on the spot.
He died in hospital 18 hours later.
The court heard the pair had a ‘volatile’ relationship leading up to the attack, which often included ‘screaming matches’ and ‘slamming doors’.
They would sometimes explode into violence.
On Friday, Crown prosecutor Ray Gibson said Daniel Surtees pleaded guilty on November 13, 2017 to unlawfully assaulting his wife and was cut loose on a bond.
He had smashed a plate of food and belted her with a toy vacuum cleaner before grabbing her around the neck.
She had retaliated by placing a knife to his throat.
‘They were as bad as each other,’ a relative would later tell police.
Leading up to Mr Surtees’ gruesome demise, the couple had argued at an engagement party.
Mr Surtees became angry and could not be placated, Mr Gibson said.
They left the party at 7pm and continued to argue in the car.
He punched the dashboard, breaking a section of it.
When the couple got home, neighbours heard them argue for a further 20 minutes before Mr Surtees was seen throwing over a garbage bin.
Angela Surtees had been a frequent contributor to her Facebook page, encouraging people to raise money for bushfire victims
The mother and sister of Angela Surtees are pursued by media as they leave the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court last year. They made no comment
Surtees was later seen crying outside.
Agitated, she grabbed a 20 litre jerry can of unleaded fuel and poured it all over her husband as he sat in an armchair on the front porch.
When he jumped up, Surtees pushed him back and lit a lighter.
‘She threatened the deceased in close proximity to him,’ Mr Gibson said.
The fumes ignited and Mr Surtees went up in flames.
Surtees herself was injured when her husband picked himself up and ran out onto the front lawn in flames.
She later lied to a triple-0 operator, telling him her husband had accidentally lit himself up.
He could be heard screaming in agony in the background as their son tried to extinguish the flames.
Surtees continued to lie to friends, family and police about how her husband had gone up in flames.
She told her mother it was her husband who had grabbed the fuel can and taunted her to set him on fire.
The killer had earlier pleaded not guilty to murder and had long denied she had even lit the blaze that killed her husband.
Despite the deal from prosecutors, the court heard on Thursday Surtees’ barristers were still not satisfied with the wording of the charge.
Jarrod Williams, for Surtees, told Justice Tinney his client did not accept that she deliberately set her husband on fire.
‘I don’t know whether it can be resolved today … or at all,’ he said.
Moments earlier, Justice Tinney said Surtees would stand to be sentenced at the highest level a person who pleaded guilty to manslaughter could be.
‘I invite the parties to give very thoughtful care to this case. It would seem to me to be inappropriate to embark on a plea if the parties are so fundamentally at issue about such an important matter,’ he warned.
A neighbour told the local news station she had previously heard sounds of a verbal altercation coming from the Surtees’ home
Footage of the scene showed the blaze reached the walls and ceiling, damaging the interior of the home
Angela Surtees, 34, of Geelong, appeared in court (above) charged with setting her husband on fire while he slept on an armchair
‘It seems clear enough if … the foundation is it was deliberate to set him on fire, that would be an instance of manslaughter at the very top of the range.’
‘There are some manslaughters that are right up, to just below a murder, and I would have thought it’s up at that category.’
Mr Gibson said the manslaughter plea would only be accepted if Surtees accepted the act to spark the lighter was deliberate.
‘We don’t accept it was an accident, but lacked the relevant murderous intent,’ he said.
‘We reject the contention it was an accident. That he lunged at her. We say he was seated in the chair when he was doused with fuel and set alight.’
In offering the plea, the Crown accepted Surtees did not mean to kill her husband when she lit the lighter, despite bringing out the fuel can, dousing her husband with fuel and activating it.
‘It was an unlawful and dangerous act,’ Mr Gibson said on Thursday.
When he returned on Friday, the Office of Public Prosecutions had backflipped again, accepting Surtees did not mean to set her husband alight.
Surtees appeared in court from her prison cell at the Dame Phyllis Frost Centre maximum security prison, where she has been kept since the attack.
While silent in the prison dock, Surtees had enjoyed a vocal presence on social media where just a few years ago she proudly showed off her wedding ring.
‘So I got married,’ she proudly shrieked in a YouTube video posted after her wedding three years ago. ‘This song is what was supposed to be our first dance but somebody hijacked our playlist.’
Angela Surtees said she would not be a slave to any man
Surtees is seen breaking out into a rendition of Celine Dion’s Tale As Old As Time from Disney’s Beauty and The Beast.
It is one of many covers the killer posted on social media before the horrific turn of events.
Other renditions included When Doves Cry, by Prince, Stay, by Rihanna, Someone Like You, by Adele, and My Precious Child, by Karen Taylor-Good.
Neighbours described Mr Surtees as a friendly person who would go out of his way to mow the lawns of his elderly neighbour.
After the attack, a half-finished can of Jim Beam remained beside the seat where Mr Surtees was sitting when he was set ablaze.
The couch was positioned just outside the front door of the couple’s family home.
It was reported the pair could be heard arguing on shortly before the incident happened.
‘I had heard yelling, screaming, but I thought nothing of it because it’s just Geelong,’ a neighbour told 9News at the time. ‘I feel sorry for the kids.’
According to social media, Surtees and her husband met in 2012 and had a photography business in Geelong.
She had recently shared numerous posts about providing aid to bushfire victims and urged friends to donate to the cause.
Angela Surtees, her husband Daniel and family in happier times
The young mum had a strong social media presence and frequently took to Facebook to post angry rants.
She described herself as a ‘selfish b**ch’ with a ‘short fuse’ in one post.
In 2013 she posted: ‘Has come to the conclusion that harnessing my hurt pain and sorrow and turning it into anger is making my normally short fuse paper thin.’
A year later she she warned people about the consequences of ‘talking s**’ about her.
Surtees continued her rants in 2016, telling the world she would not be forced to live in the kitchen ‘serving her husband’.
‘Happy wife, happy life. Unhappy wife and you bet your ass s**t is going to hit the fan. A king will take care of her king, a slave will pray the day he dies.’
Ms Surtees has revealed her husband was a hard working chef who had done time in Italian restaurants and as a baker.
She regularly posted about her struggle to find work and over the years had done everything from selling Tupperware to bartending.
At one stage, she even attempted to get on the hit cooking show Masterchef.
Surtees rated herself as a working artist and photographer, who was doing her best to remain off welfare payments to survive.
‘I am who I am,’ she posted in 2016. ‘I’ll be who I’ll be. I’ll never apologise for simply being me.’
She will return to court next month.