A husband, who tried to smother his sleeping wife with a cushion before setting her on fire with barbecue fuel and choking her, has been jailed for five years.

53-year-old Vaidotas Gedvilas, a Lithuanian national, of Ashefield, Mullingar, Co Westmeath, carried out the three-stage attack after they had a house party and the following morning “acted as if nothing happened.”

He informed Judge Keenan Johnson that it resulted from a breakdown in communication and his “failure to handle my emotions”.

The traffic management supervisor had just pleaded guilty to assault causing harm and two connected counts under Section 3A of the Non-Fatal Offences Against the Person Act 1997 for causing his wife to believe she would be immediately subjected to strangulation and suffocation.

The frenzied attack happened between November 29th and November 30th, 2024, after he had been drinking at home, Mullingar Circuit Criminal Court heard.

In evidence, Garda Stephen Jordan said he was alerted by a friend of the victim, the next morning, saw the woman with severe burns to her back, and extensive bruising to her neck, arms, chest, and legs.

She also had a burn mark on her nose and a bruise to her forehead.

The court heard the couple had a party at their house, and when the guests left, Gedvilas’s wife went into their extension to have a lie-down.

Gedvilas grabbed a cushion and put it over her face and tried to smother her, but she managed to grab a glass bottle and hit him over the head.

The victim reported to gardaí that her husband retrieved “burning liquid”, which was barbecue fuel from their shed, and knocked her to the ground.

He sat on her, lifted her jumper, doused her back with the flammable liquid, and fetched a box of matches as he told her, “I’m going to light you.”

Before he ignited the accelerant, Gedvilas also said that she would burn, and he would “sit 10 years in jail”.

He also filmed the act with his phone, with the footage being shown in court

The court heard how his wife managed to roll around and put out the fire, and then run, but he grabbed her neck and began choking her for five or six seconds. Gedvilas knocked her down, kicked her hands and legs, and pulled her hair.

His wife then got out the front door but made it a couple of steps before being pulled back into the house. She lay down, and the next morning, the accused “acted like nothing happened” while she was in severe pain.

Imprisoning him, Judge Johnson noted the exceptionally magnanimous views of the victim but said his hands were tied and he had no other option.

He admonished the accused that this type of “vicious and savage attack” would not be tolerated.

After setting a headline sentence of nine years, he considered the guilty plea and mitigation factors and reduced it to six and a half years, with the final 18 months suspended for five years, subject to a range of conditions post-release.