Tsai-Wei Hung: Woman pleads guilty to arson charges after firebombing campaign against former housemates, landlord
A factory worker engaged in a months-long terror campaign against her former housemates and landlord, seeking revenge after she was kicked out.
A Melbourne woman terrorised her former housemates and landlord for months, firebombing their homes and cars after she was evicted, a court has been told.
Tsai-Wei Hung, 33, appeared in the County Court of Victoria on Monday where she pleaded guilty to a raft of charges including arson, reckless conduct endangering serious injury, extortion and dangerous driving.
Prosecutor David Grey, for the Crown, said Hung became enraged after she was evicted from a Clyde North share house on March 10 last year.
After police were called, she packed her bags and left without issue, but Mr Grey said Hung returned an hour and a half later at 5pm “extremely angry and aggressive”.
Hung egged a garage roller door and was captured on mobile phone footage accelerating heavily and chasing her former landlord Lin Zhang and housemate Chung-Ting Yuan in her Toyota Camry.
After the pair sought refuge inside, Hung twice rammed the garage door, causing significant structural damage and damaging three vehicles inside.
The following day she returned and gained entry through the damaged roller door, smashing the cars inside before fleeing when she was spotted.
Hung voluntarily attended a police station later the same day where she was arrested, charged and bailed.
Mr Grey said Hung told police she “just wanted to scare them”.
Three months later Hung returned to the Clyde North home on June 10, where she doused two of her former housemates’ cars in petrol and set them alight about 2.50am.
Less than 10 minutes later, occupants of the home woke as the front door was set alight by Hung.
“The accused had thrown a plastic bottle containing petrol at the front door and then used matches to light the fire at the front entrance of the house,” Mr Grey said.
The following day, the prosecutor said a former housemate, Tina Zhao, with whom Hung was friendly sent her a message asking why she was doing this.
“You tell Lin give me $30,000 before 8PM tonight, and everything that happened between us will be gone …. Please tell him that he and his family have to be careful or they will have the same experience as me, or even lose more than that,” she replied.
The court was told at 4.45am on June 12, Hung attended Mr Zhang’s home in Berwick where she poured petrol over the porch.
Mr Zhang, who had seen her approach on his CCTV cameras, opened the front door to confront Hung but quickly slammed it shut when he saw her trying to light a match.
“Go to hell,” she said in Mandarin.
Hung was arrested on June 14 and has spent the past year and a half behind bars.
Six victim impact statements were read to the court by Mr Grey, including from Zhang’s two young children who detailed the terror they experienced when the house was set on fire.
Mr Zhang said he’d lived in “constant fear” of Hung between March and June, enlisting friends to stay over nightly to keep watch.
“When I saw her face-to-face I truly believed that she intended to kill my whole family,” he said.
“The repeated violence, threats and arson attacks have destroyed my sense of security … This experience has changed my view of the world and my future.”
Hung’s barrister, Courtney Hart, conceded the offending was serious and had a significant impact on the people affected.
She told the court her client had come to Australia from Taiwan on a working holiday visa in 2022 after the death of her father.
Ms Hart said the relationship between Hung and her housemates had broken down over a period of months before she was evicted from the home.
Since her arrest, the barrister said, Hung had been diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder and consistent depressive disorder.
Ms Hart said Hung had felt aggrieved about the circumstances surrounding her eviction and had alleged she was assaulted by her housemates on March 10.
The court was told she’d informed police when they attended on March 10 and made a formal statement on March 12 but no charges had been laid.
Ms Hart said a psychologist’s report had found what Hung’s mental illness had led to “an inability to stop the rumination in relation to that incident” on March 10 that carried through into June.
Judge Carolene Gwynn said Hung had shown a “determined persistence” to wreak revenge and create fear among those she believed had wronged her.
The case was adjourned part-heard and will return to court on January 20.
Originally published as Tsai-Wei Hung: Woman pleads guilty to arson charges after firebombing campaign against former housemates, landlord
