Husband Hellmut Ulin listened in horror as his African wife allegedly said: "I can hear their screams but I will do nothing to save them"
A mother allegedly locked her three daughters in a shed and burned them alive while her husband was forced to listen at the end of a phone.
It's claimed Thioro Mbow phoned her husband on his mobile and said: "Listen to their screams..." as his three precious children perished in the flames.
Husband Hellmut Ulin, 38, a foreman on a building site 12 miles away, listened in horror as his African wife allegedly told him: "I can hear their screams but I will do nothing to save them.
"You'd better hurry but you will be too late to rescue them. They won't survive."
The 35-year-old wife, who had earlier received a legal letter from her husband's lawyer demanding custody of the children, went on: "I will never surrender my children to you."
The girls' father jumped into his car and raced back to his home in Lennik, a small town near Brussels, Belgium, while phoning his sister who lives nearby to hurry round to the house.
But it was too late to save his daughters Omy, two, Abbygail, four, and Madyson, six.
All he found were their charred and lifeless bodies with their mother standing near the still smoking garden shed where it's claimed she calmly told him: "Ten minutes of screaming and then it was all over."
The only survivor was an elder daughter, nine-year-old Dyarra - a child from the mother's previous relationship - who was at school.
Her deeply shocked husband said: "I had the letter sent by a court bailiff. I wanted to give her a fright."
Family friend Viviane van Eeckhoudt, who accompanied the sister to the scene said: "There was no chance to save the little ones.
"The shed was stuffed with paper and the flames were so fierce. It was a horrible death.
"We saw the mother at the scene. There were no tears in her eyes and she did not seem to be in a panic."