A young couple struggling to get on the property ladder has been forced to buy a house of horrors where a sadistic zoologist kept a squalid torture chamber.
The three-bedroom home was owned by evil UK-born crocodile expert Adam Britton, who was jailed for a decade last year for brutally raping, torturing and mutilating pet dogs.
The unspeakable acts were largely performed and filmed in a shipping container on his 2.5-acre property, which Britton himself referred to as a ‘torture chamber’.
Britton and his ex-wife Erin bought the three-bedroom home for $250,000 in 2004, but their marriage broke down following his arrest and it hit the market last June advertised as ‘tranquility in the bush’ with a $790,000 price tag.
But real estate agents struggled to sell the property after Britton’s crimes made global headlines, with locals claiming the place was ‘haunted’ by its history.
Some speculated only foreign buyers who didn’t know the property’s history might be interested in the sale.
But the Daily Mail can now reveal a local couple have snapped it up as their first-ever home for the bargain price of just $659,000.
Dog rapist Adam Britton’s property (pictured) originally hit the market for $790,000, but was later reduced
Britton (pictured centre, with his wife Erin) once hosted Sir David Attenborough (right) in Darwin. There is no suggestion that his wife or Attenborough knew about his offending
One of the new owners, who asked not to be identified, admitted they knew about Britton’s atrocities, but they were left with little option amid soaring house prices.
‘We’re a young couple trying to get into the market,’ she told the Daily Mail.
‘We’re aware of what happened, but that’s about the person – not the place.’
But she said it was unfortunate that the property’s history had initially overshadowed the excitement of buying their first home.
‘History is not going to repeat itself, of course, and I hope others can see that,’ she said.
The house sale went through in August just before median house prices in Darwin hit $638,000 in September, after an 11.5 per cent rise in just one year.
When the Daily Mail visited the property earlier this year, Britton’s shipping container torture room was gone from the property.
According to the real estate listing, the house was designed by Troppo Architects.
Adam Britton filmed himself raping, torturing and butchering dogs in a shipping container on his property (pictured)
The property features a resort-style swimming pool (pictured) and has been architecturally designed
Britton lived at the property (pictured) from 2004 when he bought it for $250,000
‘The outdoor pavilion has 360-degree views of your own true ‘rural’ setting allowing the connection between indoor and outdoor space,’ it read.
Britton shared the home with his biologist ex-wife Erin, their saltwater crocodile Smaug, and their two Swiss Shepherds Ursa and Bolt – who he also regularly abused.
In an episode of 60 Minutes last year, Erin took viewers on a small tour of the home where Britton committed the bulk of his offences while she was away on work trips.
The tour included a backyard swamp where they kept Smaug, and an external laundry with a deep freezer, where horrified detectives found a set of dog remains.
Erin said: ‘He was mostly likely feeding those to the crocodile.’
Britton operated two Telegram accounts called ‘monster’ and ‘Cerberus’ – the latter being a three-headed dog in Greek mythology – between 2020 and 2022, and used them to engage with like-minded people about animal cruelty and bestiality.
In some of those messages, seen by the Daily Mail, Britton told his companions that he derived sexual pleasure from dead dogs.
He sourced the dogs from Gumtree Australia over a two-year period for the sole purpose of torturing them to death on camera, but would tell the former owners their pets were enjoying their new home.
The house where Britton lived with his wife Erin (above)was snapped up by a young couple in August
Inside what Britton called his torture room, he made videos of his rape and cruelty so violent and obscene it became his undoing
The dogs were typically already dead by the time updates were sent to their former owners. Most were horrifically abused and killed within a few days.
Britton told court-appointed psychologists he was chronically depressed at the age of 49 when he started making home movies of himself raping, torturing and murdering the dogs.
He falsely claimed his twisted fans online had threatened to expose him if he did not create more content, and insisted he had exaggerated his crimes to impress them.
But NT Supreme Court judge found there was no evidence Britton was depressed – he did not tell anyone about it, he didn’t write it down, nor did he seek medical help.
And he also said there was no evidence to suggest Britton was blackmailed by Telegram users.
He said it was evident from the way he described his torture videos in great detail to his online followers, while saying things like, ‘I just love hurting dogs’.
The judge also noted Britton did not help police identify those users.
He was sentenced to ten years and five months behind bars, with a non-parole period of six years, backdated to his April 2022 arrest.