A Bay of Plenty property is at the centre of a compensation claim by the family of a man bashed and stabbed to death by his wife after years of forcing her to take part in orgies.

Eileen Creamer was imprisoned for 11 years after the defensive homicide of her husband David Creamer in 2008. Photo: Julian Smith/AAP.

Eileen Creamer was in 2011 jailed for 11 years after being convicted of defensible homicide following the 2008 killing of husband David.

The couple - married in South Africa in 1997 before moving to New Zealand in 2000 and ultimately to Australia in 2006 - were in what the trial judge described as a "largely, if not entirely, dysfunctional" relationship.

During their time in New Zealand both parties engaged in affairs, hers encouraged by her husband. He repeatedly tried to make her take part in group sex.

Now, David Creamer's two sons, and first wife, have applied to the Supreme Court of Victoria for compensation as victims of the crime. The central funds sought are $150,000 of proceeds from the sale of a house in New Zealand, according to the Melbourne Age newspaper.

The new owners of the Creamer's former Papamoa property said they first realised there was something strange about the vendors during the sale process. They learned one owner was in prison and one was dead. And after a Google search they learned quickly about the Creamer story.

"We knew about their past. I knew he was a bit of ratbag and had two lives and treated her like crap and beat her up and made her do things with other men in front of him," said new owner Philip Herbert.

The Herberts bought the home in December 2013 under mortgagee sale for $375,000, after it had been rented for six years. They wouldn't be surprised if some kinky things had gone down in their new home.

"Probably, the bedrooms are pretty big," he said.

The herberts were not concerned about the property's history, and it had not affected their desire to purchase the place. "He was murdered over in Australia not here."

At her trial, a New Zealand man who became one of Eileen Creamer's lovers after meeting her on an online dating site, gave evidence of how David Creamer contacted him to make sure he was treating Eileen well.

"Not everyone wants to get a phone call from a husband of a lady he is having an affair with. That would just about knock one dead ... excuse the pun," the lover said.

David Creamer also had a number of lovers, and his wife claimed he would abuse her and force her to have sex with him.

The couple continued to have affairs when they moved to Australia despite hopes that they could make the marriage work. Eileen Creamer placed advertisements in newspapers to meet men. David Creamer had planned to recommence his relationship with his first wife.

David Creamer posted revealing photos of his wife on the internet in order to lure men into having sex with her. He contacted one website to find out if he and his wife could attend parties that promised wild sex "in an open play room", according to reports by the Age.

Eileen Creamer said she attacked her husband after he beat her and accused her of having sex with his brother. She said she beat him with a club that was a South African weapon called a knobkerrie.

She was the first person to successfully use the plea of Victoria's former defensive homicide law, which carries the same sentence as manslaughter. The defence applies if there was an abusive relationship, making an act self defence for a woman to kill her husband even if it wasn't in direct response to an act of violence.

The law has been since been repealed.