The old woman makes her way slowly down the street, past restored workers' cottages with their corrugated iron roofs and picket fences, along uneven footpaths shaded by magnolia and eucalypt trees. Bent over under a black cloak that partially obscures her face, she shuffles down Goodsir Street in Sydney's Rozelle, a high-density, inner-city suburb, in the early evening. Car doors slam, groceries are unloaded, a neighbour arrives home on a bicycle, saucepans clang, children play.

Anthony Moss stands in his doorway, calling out to his young son to come inside, when he sees the woman hobbling past. He thinks she looks like a geriatric version of Little Red Riding Hood, as she pushes open the timber gate of his next-door neighbour's, before disappearing behind the row of trees separating the two properties. He then hears her knocking on the front door of the neat, two-storey weatherboard with dormer windows.

Only moments later, Moss is standing in his living room frozen to the spot. He hears what sounds like a body thumping against the wall, then glass breaking and muffled voices. He's had skirmishes with the owner of the house, Albert Frisoli, before, so he decides not to get involved. Just to be safe, he immediately locks his doors. The disturbing noises soon give way to a reassuring silence.

What Moss doesn't know is that the cloaked person he saw entering his neighbour's is now mopping up blood and sweeping up broken glass. A body lies on the floor, that of Albert's 52-year-old brother Mario, who shares the house with him. The cloaked murderer is hiding in the darkness, laying in wait for the real target: 56-year-old Albert Frisoli.

Two more hours pass and Frisoli is parking his car on Goodsir Street while speaking on the phone to his personal assistant and de-facto partner, Natasha Kourea. At 7.20pm he puts his key in the front door. Only seconds later, a second round of disturbing thumps and muffled yells rings out. Again, no neighbours call the police.

The next morning, after Albert fails to pick up his long-time employee Mirko Naidofski for a job, the concerned Naidofski goes to the Goodsir Street house to check on him. When there is no answer after several thumping knocks, he peers through a window, forces it open and bears witness to a ghastly scene. The bloodied bodies of both brothers are lying on the living-room floor, Mario's mutilated by more than 20 stab wounds, Albert's by around 27. Albert's body has the added insult of a broken jaw and nose, and a bloodied tooth near his lip. A knife rests underneath Albert and a black scarf is wrapped around one arm and draped over his body. It has been a frenzied, cold-blooded attack.

When the police arrive, they find a trail of bloody footprints - curiously, their outlines more closely resemble those of a man's shoes rather than a woman's.

The footprints trail through the garden, leading to nearby George Street, where they abruptly cease, suggesting the killer climbed into the passenger seat of a car. (Was the murderer, in fact, a man? Did he or she have an accomplice?)

Later in the morning a devastated Natasha Kourea arrives at the house, declaring through a veil of tears, "I know who did this."

For weeks after this gruesome double murder in May 2009, numerous news stories were accompanied by faded photographs of the brothers, usually unsmiling and looking earnest, giving no hint of their lives as fathers and family men, noted for their warmth and humour. Albert - who worked in the construction industry and was father of a son, Holden, and a daughter, Atlanta - had a collection of guitars and records, and a recording studio he built for himself in his basement. "It was his No. 1 love, it was how he communicated," says the Frisolis' sister, Margaret White. "He used to write his own songs, he was very, very talented.''

Mario, a former truck driver and father of two daughters, Shannon and Erica, was on a disability pension and spent most of his time at home in Rozelle, but he was, in the words of 21-year-old Erica, a "jack of all trades". He was, she says affectionately, "the smell of aftershave, cigarettes and a new car. Hot chips and frozen Cokes." Mario's ex-wife Rhonda jokes that he went from having ''long hair to having no hair'', was once a rally driver and loved tinkering with cars.

It wasn't the first time the Frisoli family had been struck by tragedy. Albert was four when the family arrived from Foggia in southern Italy, back then a lawless region in which people meted out their own brand of justice. His father, Nick, had come to work on the Snowy Mountains Scheme. Later they shared a small house in Batlow, about 100 kilometres from Wagga Wagga, with his mother's family. The adult men worked in the local orchards.

One day in 1958, after a heated argument, Nick Frisoli shot his brother-in-law Leonardo Di Biccari, who died from the wounds. Recalls Margaret White: "They had a fight over land. Leonardo threatened to kill Dad. Dad obviously reacted and got a shotgun and took that out on him before he could do anything to anyone else."

Then 32, Nick Frisoli was charged with murder but found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to 10 years' jail with hard labour. His sons were aged one and five at the time. Mario once wrote that he and Albert were "forced into an environment not of our own choosing". Kourea says Albert found it tough growing up as an Italian immigrant in regional NSW in the 1950s. ''He hated it and he got bullied, and he didn't like anyone else being bullied or pushed around.''

Forty years later, in July 1998, Nick Frisoli went missing on his morning walk, leaving his wallet and keys behind. He was found floating in the Murrumbidgee River more than a week later. Mario's daughter Erica remembers her dad "crying into my mother's arms". Mario believed his father's death had been related to a dispute in Italy and in 1999 he urged police to re-investigate the matter, arguing there had been no water in his father's lungs and thus no evidence of drowning. Erica says: "He didn't feel that the police were doing enough, so he was working day and night trying to find out what had happened."

Albert, who inherited his father's interest in labour and building, was also distraught, but by this stage he'd become immersed in his business interests. Starting off as a draftsman, he'd gone on to become director of several companies, working mostly in construction and concreting. Only a year before the death of his father, Albert had gone into partnership with businessman Giuseppe Di Cianni in several companies. They had shareholdings in a block of land in Sydney's Wetherill Park and various other interests.

In 1999, Di Cianni lost at least $100,000 through his involvement with Tim Brachmanis, who was running a "business" importing luxury cars. "The guy was pretty flash, drove a Porsche, talked the talk," says Kourea. "Albert was wary of him, but Giuseppe was like, 'No, no, he's all good, I trust him, he is like a son to me.'

"Brachmanis took off with the money. No cars were ever brought into the country. Di Cianni went to America looking for him."

Around this time, Di Cianni met divorcee Josephine Pintabona at Sydney's Marconi Club, a meeting place for Italian nationals in the suburb of Bossley Park, and he later employed her to clean his and Albert's offices. The pair constantly insisted they were just "friends"; after all, Di Cianni was married and living with his wife. "She was just a housewife," says Kourea, "a normal, nice, pleasant housewife. She would talk about her daughters, one of them was getting married. I don't know what she saw in him to be honest."

In late 2000, Di Cianni was diagnosed with bowel cancer and underwent surgery and chemotherapy. After his treatment he would go into the office a couple of times a week, but was not actively involved in running the business. His son, Robert, managed a concrete pumping company from the same offices, but was allegedly struggling with drug addiction. "His father was pushing him into the business to get him off drugs, but he was irrational," Kourea would later tell the court. "He would often come in demanding a wage even though he didn't turn up for work. There was tension between him and his father."

The concrete company later folded. "[Robert] was not a businessperson or a hard worker, he was just off the rails," says Kourea. Di Cianni "had a lot of assets, but he lost so much with Brachmanis and his son that he was over-extended. He thought he would find money somewhere else."

By 2002, Di Cianni had come to believe that Albert was defrauding him for his share of their lucrative business. Di Cianni would demand to see the books and they would argue in Italian. Over the next few years, Albert made frequent complaints to police that Di Cianni was using standover tactics and threats of violence to get what he believed he was owed. But Albert never pressed charges because he felt it might aggravate the situation.

In early 2006, Di Cianni came to the office with Pintabona and asked to see Albert in the kitchen. "I heard raised voices," says Kourea, "and I could see Giuseppe was pushing Albert against the wall. There was yelling. Giuseppe pulled out a syringe and said, 'This is what you get if you don't do what I want.' He wanted him to sign a deed regarding a property."

A month later, Di Cianni, his son Robert and Pintabona again came to the office. "As they were closing the door, Albert yelled, 'Call the police', " says Kourea. "As I picked up my phone, Giuseppe ran into my office and ripped the phone out of my hand and said, 'Get off the phone, you f...ing bitch', and ripped the phone out of the wall."

Then, in the pre-dawn darkness one day in March that year, a concreter, Tony Aloisi, noticed the lights were switched on in the office and found Di Cianni inside. As Aloisi would later testify: "He took me to Albert's office and he had a briefcase in his hand and said, 'This gets me all the proof I need. I'm going to kill the bastard - him and his kids.' "

Margaret White remembers getting a call from Albert as the feuds escalated. "It was September 2006 and he just rang and wanted to connect. I knew there was something wrong because he had never rung me in the middle of the afternoon before. I knew he was down. Albert and I never discussed the business side of things. He had to protect his family and his little sister, I guess."

As the threats increased, Albert took out an apprehended violence order (AVO) against Di Cianni. He also moved offices, so they could, says Kourea, ''run the business without being constantly harassed and threatened". On moving day they saw Di Cianni's car parked outside the new office. He was charged with breaching an AVO.

Determined to get his own back, Di Cianni in 2008 went to the police to complain that his signature had been forged on a share transfer document four years earlier. Albert and Kourea were charged with fraud. But when the case was due to begin in the Downing Centre Court on April 27, 2009, Di Cianni conceded the signatures on the share transfer form might have been his own after a handwriting expert threw doubts on his claims. The case was withdrawn and the charges were dropped - Di Cianni owed a private investigator $198,000 and a lawyer $165,000 without even getting his day in court.

After years of animosity between the men over money and property, the failed case was the final straw for Di Cianni. Less than two weeks later, he would be committing a double murder. It's believed that Di Cianni was watching the Frisoli house in the days before the murders, conducting surveillance while he planned his attack.

He disguised himself as an old woman that evening by wearing the black scarf, a cloak and a wig, getting Mario, whom he had never met before, out of the way before beating and stabbing Albert to death. Meanwhile, Di Cianni's lover, Josephine Pintabona, was waiting for him in her car parked around the corner.

"It was rage," says experienced former homicide investigator Detective Inspector Mick Sheehy. Explains Margaret White: "He felt wronged by Al and I think it was a matter of honour." Rhonda Frisoli agrees: "It had become a very personal thing. An ego. There wasn't going to be a winner."

During the long years of disputes with Di Cianni, which also involved a civil case, Kourea says the couple occasionally wondered just how far it would escalate. ''We said, 'He wouldn't harm us. Who would do that? We live in Australia. This doesn't happen. He'd ruin his own life, he'd go to jail. No human being would do that, would they?'

''What he did to Mario ... he was willing to kill another person just to get to Albert."

When the police arrived at his Edensor Park house three days after the murders, Di Cianni was civility itself, welcoming in the detectives. Detective Sergeant David Chambers told the court: "He presented with no obvious signs of injury or illness. He had a strong physique consistent with a person being in the concrete trade for many years. He was wearing dress shoes.

"He said he had found out the day before what happened to the Frisoli brothers. He said, 'I didn't kill them, I didn't arrange it, I am not involved. Albert had a great many enemies.' He said he had been at home all week with cancer, taking a high dose of medication. He only went out once a week to take his wife to the club for lunch."

Di Cianni claimed his son had also been at home the whole time. (Robert Di Cianni had, in fact, been entertaining women in different hotels around the city that week.)

Despite his protestations of innocence, Di Cianni made an urgent application for a passport and booked plane tickets to Italy in the days after the murder. With Pintabona, he met his lawyer and accountant to sign power of attorney to his son. A weeping Pintabona, who had no criminal record, told her friend Dina Baker that she had to leave to go to Italy. Recalls Baker: "She said, 'I need to get away.' I said, 'Are you in trouble?' She said, 'No.' She said she was going with Giuseppe, that he had an appointment with a doctor for cancer."

If the couple were expecting an easy getaway, they were mistaken. Police were at Sydney Airport to accompany them through security on May 12. Television crews were waiting, microphones poised. Pintabona told police Di Cianni was sick and going to Italy for cancer treatment. She showed them his tablets in her bag. But Di Cianni's specialist, Dr Stephen Fulham, would later testify that his patient did not have cancer and had been in remission for some time. Police did not have enough evidence to stop Di Cianni from travelling overseas, but they made it clear they were on his case. "Listen," Di Cianni said in Italian to a detective, "don't be sly with me. I know what game you guys play. You think I killed Albert and his brother. Prove it."

And that's exactly what the police did in the time Di Cianni was away, joining a host of forensic dots. The bloody footprints were clearly those of a man; fibres were found on the bodies consistent with a wig; DNA from Di Cianni and Pintabona was discovered on the black scarf draped over Albert's body. Di Cianni's DNA was also found on an axe handle in Pintabona's unit.

Pintabona briefly returned from Italy in June, 2009. When the police visited her unit in Fairfield, she told them Di Cianni had come past her place on the morning of the murders to drop off some green vegetables he had grown in his yard. "He was too sick and went home,'' she said. She added that later, she went to his house to pick up some tomato sauce he had made.

At the time, Pintabona was estranged from her family because of the illicit relationship. "She said her family were out to get her," her friend Baker says. "She had been quite wealthy," says Inspector Sheehy. "She had sold a block of flats in Sydney. But she had put the money in a bank account in Italy and the financial collapse happened and she couldn't get it out."

Returning from Italy again in January 2010, Pintabona admitted to police that she had been the only driver of her silver Hyundai on the day of the murders. She left for Italy again on April 16. The next time she would not return voluntarily. When Italian police arrested Di Cianni at a cafe in Cosenza, Calabria, on August 18, 2010, he was, says Inspector Sheehy, "pretty silent". Looking malnourished, with his arm bandaged from a suicide attempt, he was "pretty ordinary. He was resigned to the fact that he had to face it."

Nonetheless, Di Cianni fought authorities' attempts to return him to Australia on health grounds, and he was finally extradited to Australia in April, 2011. Pintabona was arrested and brought back to Australia in August last year. At their trial, both flatly denied any involvement in the killings. Di Cianni looked directly at his barrister and shook his head when asked if he murdered the brothers. During her evidence, Pintabona said, ''I don't like violence, I don't like the sight of blood.''

At one point, Di Cianni was caught passing a note to Pintabona as they sat together in the elevated wooden dock. Folded in four and written in Italian, the note appeared to be giving Pintabona instructions to explain how their DNA was found on the scarf and Albert's on the trim of her car.

''You must tell your lawyer that in addition to cleaning the office each week you used to take home towels, napkins, rugs and other rags from the office in order to wash them in your own washing machine,'' an English translation of the note said.

''Moreover, you always parked your car in front of the entrance to the office. When Mr Frisoli ... used to light up a cigarette he did not smoke inside the office, but rather went outside and sat or leant against your car as it was always parked in front of the office.

''When you came to clean the office on many occasions you would pick up Mr Frisoli's black scarf from the kitchen table or chairs and take it to his office.''

Di Cianni told the court he was just trying to remind Pintabona, a ''simple woman'', of her work in their offices. Pintabona, who appeared every day at the trial with blow-dried blonde hair, and holding a prayer card in her manicured hands, said a blood stain found in her car was caused by two rump steaks she had bought for Easter. ''I was going to make a roast ... and as I was driving home that day, I slammed the brakes and the plastic on the meat split,'' she said.

On June 24 this year, after a month-long trial and weeks of deliberations, the jury rejected their litany of alibis and excuses. Di Cianni was found guilty of two counts of murder. Pintabona was found guilty of two counts of being an accessory after the fact. One of her daughters sat sobbing in the public gallery as she watched her shocked mother being taken down to the holding cells.

It had been a long four years of continual grief for the Frisoli family, as they sat out Di Cianni and Pintabona's extradition, the court process and, finally, the longest jury deliberation Acting Justice Robert Shallcross Hulme said he had ever experienced.

At a sentencing hearing in mid-August, Di Cianni and Pintabona, now with the dark roots of her long ash-blonde hair exposed, sat impassively in the court as the brothers' families spoke of their permanently fractured lives.

Many visibly braced themselves before glancing across the courtroom at the pair, who sat squashed together in the small dock of Court 2 in the King Street Court Complex. "I looked up a couple of times when I was speaking," says Mario's 24-year-old daughter, Shannon, "and [Di Cianni] was just blank. [Pintabona] was checking her watch, like she had somewhere to be."

On September 13, Di Cianni was sentenced to 30 years' jail. He will be 96 by the time he is eligible for parole. Pintabona was given a maximum four-year sentence; she will be eligible for parole in March 2016. At the earlier committal hearing, Shannon declared to the court. "I miss my Dad, and I hurt, every single day."