JASON Adams was unarmed, alone and posed 'no threat' to Lily Ridgeway when he arrived at a house at Raymond Terrace in the early hours of February 29, 2020.
But a traumatised background of domestic violence, a childhood of dysfunction and disadvantage, drug use and the fact she hadn't slept in 10 days meant Ridgeway was in an emotionally dysregulated state and conditioned to see danger and violence all around her.
So when Mr Adams made a slight move towards her or grabbed her by the jacket, Ridgeway reacted to a threat that was not real and responded by stabbing him once in the chest, the blade penetrating his heart.
He stumbled down the road, collapsed in the middle of an intersection and died.
"While this was an entirely needless killing," Justice Helen Wilson said on Friday. "Ms Ridgeway's act was the culmination of years of trauma, violence and abuse.
"And even though on the evidence Mr Adams posed no threat to her, Ms Ridgeway was primed to see danger all around her, her perceptions distorted by the drug use in the previous days and her response was an instinctive one."
Justice Wilson jailed Ridgeway for a maximum of seven years and seven months, with a non-parole period of five years. With time served, she will be out in August 2025.
Ridgeway was acquitted of murdering Mr Adams after a trial in 2021, but after deliberating for more than 45 hours the jury was deadlocked on the alternative charge of manslaughter.
A re-trial held earlier this year ended when the jury found Ridgeway guilty of manslaughter, finding either that she was not acting in self-defence or that her response was not reasonable under the circumstances.
The fatal confrontation had its roots in a series of text messages between Mr Adams and Ridgeway's friend, Nikita Hanson, on the night of February 28 and into the early hours of February 29, 2020.
Mr Adams had been granted bail to live at Ms Hanson's house in Payton Street, but within a few days their relationship had soured to the point where Mr Adams had been thrown out.
That expletive-laden text message exchange culminated in Mr Adams returning to Ms Hanson's house about 5.20am where he was confronted outside by Ms Ridgeway, who had armed herself with a knife.
She stabbed him once and left him to die, catching a taxi out of the area before ditching the knife and jacket and getting picked up.
Ridgeway wrote a letter of apology to Mr Adams' family, expressing remorse and claiming "I was not myself that night". "I feel sick with sadness about what happened that night because I know that is not the woman I wanted to be," she said.
