The estranged wife of union boss John Setka threatened to kill him in 'out of the blue' comments to a private investigator, a magistrate has found.
Magistrate Leon Fluxman ruled on Friday that the charge against Emma Walters had been proven to involve a threat of death.
She was captured on a recording telling private detective Adrian Peeters: 'I have to kill the father of my children to survive, you are going to help me figure out how to do that'.
The comments were revealed in a secret video played in the Melbourne Magistrates Court, which Mr Peeters said was prompted to start recording by Walters also previously making the threat.
Emma Walters (white coat) arrives at the Melbourne Magistrates Court on Friday – where a magistrate found she threatened to kill John Setka
“She said out of the blue that she needed a piece,” Fluxman said Friday.
The magistrate rejected Walters' claims that she spoke to Mr Peeters as a friend, out of frustration and using 'flowery' language.
Rather, the pair had only spoken on the phone to organize a debugging job. She made it “absolutely clear that she had reached the end of her tether… and this was her last option.”
Her claim that she coerced the private investigator into a quote was “simply not credible,” the magistrate said.
Walters, 47, shared two children with the Victorian secretary of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union.
The magistrate found that Walters was at the very least reckless as to whether Mr Peeters would fear that she would carry out the threat.
She was charged again with attempting to commit a criminal offense after police alleged she tried to obtain a gun.
Ms. Walters is questioned by police shortly after her arrest over allegations that she threatened to kill John Setka
But Mr Fluxman dismissed that charge after Walters' lawyer argued there was no evidence to back up the gun's description.
Mr Peeters said he started recording on his phone for his own safety about 10 minutes in, after she told him she wanted to 'lure' Mr Setka to the house.
“I know how to use a weapon, and I am prepared to bear the consequences of having to go through the legal process of self-defense,” Peeters is told in the video.
“I have to kill the father of my children to survive, and that's not a good position to be in. “Anyway, you're going to help me figure out how to do that.”
She then hears Mr Peeters say that she was a 'lawyer by profession' and that 'this conversation never took place… once it is in court you cannot say you have any knowledge of it'.
Walters told police she did not want to kill John Setka, but had to protect herself.
After leaving the premises, Mr Peeters said he contacted Mr Setka through the union to warn him. He then reported the incident to the police.