Antonia Gawith recalled the harrowing events of August 21 last year, when her abusive ex set fire to her sister’s home, killing four members of her family
Emergency services at the scene in Westbury Road in Bradford (Image: PA Archive/PA Images)
A heartbroken sister has recalled making a desperate plea to emergency services to save her family before they died in a house fire.
Antonia Gawith said she was unable to save her sister Bryonie and her three children – aged nine, five and 22 months – after her former partner Sharaz Ali, 40, set their home on fire.
Antonia had ended her seven-year relationship with abuser Ali and was staying with her sister Bryonie when he set fire to their Bradford home in the early hours of August 21 last year.
She recalled going downstairs after getting home from her shift at Tesco and seeing an ‘angry’ Ali run into the house with a can of petrol and a lighter. As he doused her in petrol, she tried to wrestle the canister from him.
Unable to get stop him, Antonia ran outside hoping that he would follow her out of the house. Realising he was still inside, she went back towards the house and saw sister Bryonie, who had been sleeping in the main bedroom and had woken up, kick Ali down the stairs.
Antonia said Ali then hit the lighter, igniting the petrol and setting himself and the house on fire.
Bryonie Gawith and her three children, Denisty, 9, Oscar, 5, and Aubree, 22 months(Image: West Yorkshire Police )
On Wednesday, Ali was found guilty of murder and attempted murder at Bradford Crown Court following a trial. In a video interview played to jurors during the trial, Antonia sobbed as she told police she “couldn’t save” her sister, nieces and nephew.
She had said she had tried to get in through the back door, which was jammed shut, while screaming for help. In tears, she recalled: “I was just screaming, trying to get back in the house and I couldn’t get in. I couldn’t save them.”
The court heard the first police officers on the scene managed to break the door down and pull Ali from the blaze, but when firefighters arrived it was too late to save Bryonie, who was found on the floor next to her bed, and the three children, who were all found in their beds.
Antonia said she wanted to get upstairs to get to her family, but she was kept away by emergency services as she was still covered in petrol.
“They said it wasn’t safe,” she recalled. “I was just begging them all and screaming and crying, and I just wanted to save them and I just couldn’t. I couldn’t do anything. They wouldn’t let me go up – I just wanted to be with her.”
Footage played during the trial was edited to mute screaming, which may have been from one of the children.
Antonia Gawith, Ali’s former partner, who survived the fire(Image: Dave Higgens/PA Wire )
Antonia said Ali was “quite controlling” and violent during their relationship, and that her sister was the one person she could talk to after losing many of her friends. She said she gave her the ‘confidence’ to end the relationship but Ali blamed her for the break up.
She said: “He used to go out on benders and get drunk and not come home, I was scared to leave him. I was just so scared of him. I don’t know why I stayed with him.”
The court heard that messages Ali sent Antonia in the days before the fire appear to show him threatening her. One said: “I know who has caused this in my life, whether they meant to or not. Better start praying cos now I’m going to get involved in her life and everyone is going to feel it. I promise you one thing, they’re going to regret it.”
Asked about the message during her evidence, Antonia said: “I think it must have been about my sister because I was staying with her… Just because I’d told her everything and she knew everything. She was always there for me so obviously he blamed her for me taking that decision to leave him.”
Sharaz Ali, 40, murdered Bryonie Gawith and her three children, Denisty Birtle, Oscar Birtle, and Aubree Birtle(Image: West Yorkshire Police)
Following Wednesday’s verdicts, Antonia reading a statement on behalf of her family outside court. She said: “Even with justice, nothing will ever make this right. Nothing will ever fill the silence where their laughter should be. Nothing will ever bring back our family.”
She continued: “We will forever carry this brokenness, and yet we will hold on to them tightly in only ways we can now, through our memories, our photos and our precious videos. Those are all we have left now. This trial has drained us in ways words can only describe. It has been a long, agonising, heart shattering journey.
“Now that justice has finally been served, we can at last allow ourselves the space to truly grieve for our beautiful family who should still be with us now.”
Paying tribute to her sister, nieces and nephew, Antonia said: “Their futures were stolen. The children will never grow up, never experience life in all the ways they deserve, and our B will never grow old with us.”
The statement described “our beautiful B” (Bryonie) as “the glue that held us all together” and “the most devoted mother to her three children”.
It said Denisty (“Chuch”) was “blossoming into such a confident, creative soul” who was “always by her mum’s side, helping, caring, loving with maturity far beyond her years”.
Antonia said Oscar (“Oggy”) survived open heart surgery at just five-days-old and was “strong, cheeky and full of life that was only just beginning”.
She said Aubree (“Strawberry”) was “so tiny, so joyful, so pure of innocence” and “made us smile without even trying”.
She added: “We will love them for the rest of our lives. We will miss them in every breath. Our heart will never be whole again. They will be forever young, forever ours, forever missed beyond words.”
