‘Australian Survivor’ contestant Joel Betts jailed for attempted murder
Qantas baggage handlers watch a TV screen during a strike at Sydney International Airport on Sept. 20, 2011.
Joel Betts, a former contestant on "Australian Survivor," has been sentenced to 11 years' jail for the attempted murder of his girlfriend.
Betts, 32, pleaded guilty to stabbing Samantha Holland more than two dozen times and holding her hostage in their apartment in Sydney's inner-west in April 2010, reported The Daily Telegraph.
Holland, 25, who survived the attack by convincing Betts to give her the knife so they could "die together," had reportedly gone to the apartment they'd shared to collect her possessions after their relationship break-up.
She jumped off the balcony of the third floor apartment to escape him, despite having been repeatedly in the back and neck in the April 17, 2010, attack, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.
She even testified at Betts' trial, telling how he tried to stop her from leaving the apartment unit.
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"I'm still haunted by the look in his eyes as he towered over me and stabbed me in the neck," she said.
After his appearance on "Survivor," Betts had become a socialite in Sydney and a presenter on the Murdoch-owned Foxtel channel.
Judge Robert Toner described his crime as "vile" and said Holland would have to live with the "psychological trauma" of what happened to her.
"[The attack] must have felt like an eternity to her, beyond anything she could have ever imagined," he said.
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