A disabled wife humiliated by her husband in an unhappy marriage set fire to their marital home.

Dawn Spaven risked the life of her 72-year-old neighbour when she poured oil over two beds in her terraced council house and walked out leaving them burning behind her, York Crown Court heard.

She was taking her revenge on husband Graham Spaven after he treated her in a way Judge Paul Hoffman said "no wife should endure".

Simon Batiste, prosecuting, said the fire in Constantine Avenue, Tang Hall caused £14,500 damage.

It burnt unhindered for nearly an hour until elderly next-door neighbour Wanda Walker went into her garden and spotted smoke pouring out of the house's rafters. Dawn Spaven, 38, pleaded guilty to causing arson and being reckless as to whether life would be endangered on September 18. She suffers from multiple sclerosis and walks with a stick.

Judge Hoffman said the normal sentence for such an offence was three to five years.

But he decided "exceptionally" to give her the maximum possible suspended sentence of two years suspended for two years. He also ordered the probation service to supervise her for a year.

"You were and had been for some time labouring under intolerable stress," he told her.

"That morning, you had been humiliated to a point which no wife should endure, by your husband".

Her illness meant jailing her would have a "deleterious" effect on her health.

"I think it would be a cruel thing to do," he said.

For Spaven, Felicity Davies said she had increasingly felt trapped in the marriage. Her health meant that if she walked out on her husband she would have nothing but the clothes she stood in.

She had tried unsuccessfully in the past to leave him.

On September 18, her husband left her a "very humiliating" sexual note. He further humiliated her when he returned briefly for lunch.

"She decided she was going to go. She would take nothing, but leave him with less than he thought he had by setting fire to the property," said Miss Davies.

Mr Batiste said Mrs Spaven took the batteries out of the house's smoke alarms while the husband was at work.

While the fire burned she took a taxi to York District Hospital and told her social worker what she had done. The worker immediately phoned police.

A fire officer later estimated that had the fire not been discovered when it was, it would have quickly spread to neighbouring houses.

It caused £4,000 structural damage and £10,570 damage to items in the house.

Dawn Spaven now lives in another part of the country.

Updated: 10:35 Friday, January 26, 2001