Black Widow Vicky Efandis stole lonely man’s heart, money and life

Greedy Vicky Efandis stole a lonely man’s heart. Then she cooked him his favourite meal, laced it with drugs, set his house on fire and left him to die.

black widow murder vicky efandis

Black Widow Vasiliki “Vicky” Efandis stole a lonely man’s heart.

Then she cooked him his favourite meal laced with drugs, set his house on fire and left him to die — after manipulating her way into control of his home, business and finances.

Efandis, a disability pensioner and house cleaner, crept into the life of George Marcetta, a 56-year-old divorced father who ran a very successful painting business, in 2002.

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Through fake affection, Efandis infiltrated Mr Marcetta’s life and they began a relationship.

The dominating, manipulative and scheming Efandis, then 44, took control of his business and financial affairs.

On September 8, 2004, Mr Marcetta’s charred body was found in the burnt-out bedroom of his fire-ravaged Bellfield home.

Toxicology tests revealed he’d been drugged.

Efandis was arrested and charged with murder.

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Court sketch of Vasiliki (Vicky) Efandis.

George Marcetta, 58, was murdered for his money.

She spent some time in jail and faced a committal hearing at Melbourne Magistrates’ Court, during which a friend of Mr Marcetta, Zoran Obradovic, said Efandis controlled the purse strings.

“George (told me), ‘I can’t lend you any money because Vicky is controlling the money’,” Mr Obradovic told the preliminary hearing.

In a police statement tendered at the committal hearing, a former prisoner who shared a cell with Efandis said another inmate drew a picture of a black spider on a pinboard in their cell where Efandis allegedly confessed to murder.

In her statement the former prisoner said: “Vicky asked me one night, ‘Do you think I lit the fire?’ I said to her, ‘Well did you?’ Vicky said, ‘It was arranged. We did it but they’ve got nothing.’ She told me the fire at the house had been planned for a few months.”

The former prisoner said she believed Efandis had tried to poison her in jail by slipping rat poison or snail bait into her tea.

At the end of the committal proceeding, Efandis pleaded not guilty to murder.

She was granted bail pending her 2008 Supreme Court trial.

GEORGE MARCETTA’S LAST SUPPER

The jury was told Efandis took control of her partner’s finances and on the night of September 8, 2004, laced a home-cooked meal with sedatives and left Mr Marcetta to die in his burning Bellfield home.

For his last supper, Efandis had cooked Mr Marcetta his favourite dish — pork rolls and noodles.

She laced it with a large dose of the sedative Serapax.

In the preceding months her doctor had twice prescribed her Serapax, Prosecutor John Champion, SC, told the jury.

Efandis was found guilty of murder.

Zoran Orbradovic was Mr Marcetta's best friend.

After drugging Mr Marcetta, who ended up in his bed, Efandis then splashed up to 28 litres of kerosene around the home and lit small newspaper fires in nearly every room.

By that stage, Mr Champion told the court, Efandis had come to be in control of a large amount of Mr Marcetta’s assets and stood to gain financially from his death.

Mr Marcetta had sold his Dandenong home and entered into a joint contract to purchase the Bellfield property, which was registered in Efandis’s name.

She’d gained a 50 per cent share of his business and convinced him to register a Jaguar car in her daughter’s name.

“Over a relatively short period of time Vicky Efandis insinuated herself into George Marcetta’s personal and business life, and business affairs, to the extent where she became a controlling and dominant figure,” Mr Champion told the jury.

Efandis had told police that, on the night of the fire, she left the house between 10pm and 10.30pm and, from her home in Ivanhoe, sent Mr Marcetta a goodnight text to which he replied with a text of his own.

But a telecommunications expert told the court both messages were sent from the Bellfield home.

Efandis tried to blame the murder on a man who’d previously argued with Mr Marcetta, the court was told.

After three days of deliberation, the jury agreed upon a guilty verdict.

A CHILLING CRIME WITH NO REMORSE

In November 2008, Justice Stephen Kaye sentenced Efandis to 24 years’ jail with a 20-year minimum.

Justice Kaye described the crime as chilling, saying that while Mr Marcetta was very fond of Efandis she had “no sentimental attachment to him at all”.

“Rather,” Justice Kaye told Efandis, “you insinuated your way into his life, gained his trust and then abused it in the most appalling way. You resorted to lacing his favourite meal with the sleeping tablets, in order to prepare him for his death.

Athanasia Marcetta, George Marcetta’s daughter, is comforted outside court.

Efandis showed no pity for her partner.

“It was only fortuitous that Mr Marcetta did not survive long in the fire. However, you were not to know that.

“By drugging him and then setting fires around him, you potentially condemned him to die helplessly in the midst of a horrifying inferno.”

Efandis showed no emotion as the judge described her greed-driven crime as evil.

“You showed no pity to your unwitting victim,” Justice Kaye said, “and you clearly suffered no pangs of conscience as you set about murdering him.

“(It) can only be described as chilling …(You) callously exploited his attraction to and affection for you in order to murder him for his wordily assets.”

Mr Marcetta’s daughter, Athanasia Marcetta, cried in court.

Outside afterwards, Ms Marcetta said Efandis was a ruthless, greedy and cold-blooded killer.

“She deserves everything she got,” Ms Marcetta said.