Diary recorded beatings and starvation

The three may have escaped justice if a damning diary detailing their abuse had not been discovered.

Amanda Baggus casually described how she and her partner David Lehane bullied and beat Kevin Davies for four months.

Baggus had beaten the handyman after her car had overturned and then allowed Lehane to join in.

Homeless, naïve and lonely, the 29-year-old was locked away in the couple’s windowless, metal shed, where he would spend the next four months, being repeatedly beaten.

Baggus took his social security money to pay off her household bills, while their captive was held hostage.

Baggus only began keeping the diary to help with her depression.

The violence became more extreme as weeks turned into months. Mr Davies was being burnt — possibly with a hot knife and a corrosive liquid — as her notes became more scornful of their prisoner.

Another entry, earlier in the month, also revealed how they were effectively starving him and fed him “scraps” whenever they could be bothered. Davies had lost 21kg since living in the shed.

On the day of his death, Baggus and Lehane visited the shed and hit him repeatedly in the face. Baggus also hit him over the head with a jug.

His blood-stained body collapsed as he was dragged into the kitchen. Baggus rang 999 later that night, but he was dead by the time they got there.