This is the story of a couple who wanted to sell their house and then move into a rented accomodation for a while.

Well, nothing special there! Lots of people are doing the same lately.

But in this case, a cheating husband pursuaded wife to sell the house before breaking the news. Couple put the house on sale, and soon after sold it for £210,000.

A day before the exchange of contracts was to take place, wife found out that the husband was out with another woman. Outraged, she decided to take matters in her own hands. Determined that husband must never get a penny out of the sale, she poured petrol in one place upstairs and three places downstairs and set it ablaze.

Then she went to her mother's house.

The fire cost the couple £110,000 because the house was sold after the fire for £100,000 less than its value before fire. The couple were going to make £50,000 after the sale and after paying mortgage and other loans but this left them penniless.

Wife, Deborah Jackson, 45, admitted arson and was handed a one year prison sentence suspended for two years by Leicester Crown Court yesterday.

Nicholas Syfret QC said, "confronted with clear evidence of her husband's infidelity, she took revenge on him by setting fire to the house from which she would have otherwise have benefited."

She added, "he's effectively punished herself by what she's done."