Man who set fire to ex-girlfriend's home jailed

Nicholas Martin was on bail for assaulting his ex-partner when he set her home on fire

A man who posted petrol through his ex-girlfriend's letterbox while she was sleeping and set it alight has been jailed.

Nicholas Martin, 63, targeted the house in Worsley, Salford, in the middle of the night on 21 October last year.

The woman, who said she felt "absolute horror" when she realised her home was on fire, jumped out of a window to escape and broke both her ankles and a vertebrae.

Martin, of Leicester, was sentenced to 30 years for attempted murder and grievous bodily harm, after previously assaulting the woman.

'Flashbacks and nightmares'

The victim told Manchester Minshull street Crown Court Martin's "vile and monstrous actions" had "utterly destroyed and decimated" her life.

Greater Manchester Police said the relationship began in 2019 and Martin had installed home cameras, controlling what the woman ate, wore and watched on television.

At the time of the attempted murder, Martin was on bail for assaulting the victim in August 2021 while on holiday in Scotland.

He was ordered not to contact her and to stay in Leicester but he booked into a hotel and waited until the middle of the night to attack her house.

A victim statement said: "I am still often consumed by the same feelings of terror, experiencing flashbacks, distressing memories and nightmares of the fire and aftermath."

Martin poured petrol through the letterbox and set light to it.

"The chilling memory of the clear thought that I was going to die, the choking feeling of smoke inhalation, and the fall as I jumped out of the bedroom window, will never leave me," she added.

She said she had undergone many months of trauma therapy and clinical psychology sessions.

Martin was arrested on 23 October 2024 at a hotel in the Lake District, where a can containing petrol was recovered in the hotel room wardrobe.

Despite later admitting to causing the fire, he claimed he had no intention to kill his ex-partner. He was found guilty after a trial in September.