Melbourne couple lose appeal after being caught with a slave

A Melbourne couple found guilty of possessing an elderly slave in their suburban home has failed to overturn their conviction, despite a court finding that the victim had ‘lied’ on their evidence.

Kumuthini and Kandasamy Kannan were both found guilty by a Supreme Court jury in 2021 for possessing a slave and exercising power over a slave and were sentenced to eight and six years in prison respectively.

The conviction targeted an elderly Tamil woman who lived in the Kannans’ Glen Waverley home in Melbourne between 2007 and 2015.

But in a new trial heard in February at the Victorian Court of Appeal, the Kannans, who are husband and wife, argued in separate bids that the victim’s testimony was “so implausible” that the jury should have had reasonable doubt about their guilt. .

In their verdict Tuesday, Justices Phillip Priest, Richard Niall and Cameron Macaulay said that while the victim had “sworn, feigned and lied” in parts of her evidence, there was still ample evidence that the Kannans were guilty of the multiple slavery offenses .

The victim, who cannot be identified due to a court order, arrived in Australia from South India in 2007 and lived in the Kannan family home until she was rushed to hospital in July 2015.

The paramedics present found the victim in a pool of her own urine, barely conscious, weighing only 40 kg, suffering from hypothermia, changes in consciousness, urinary sepsis and untreated type 2 diabetes.

The victim then gave evidence that she had been subjected to severe beatings and endured horrific living conditions.

This included evidence that she had been held as a prisoner in the Kannans’ home and was unable to leave when the Kannans travelled, stabbed, beaten with sticks and frozen chicken, scalded with boiling water, and repeatedly hit on the head with a plate.

Judges Priest, Niall and Macaulay found that there was no medical evidence to support any of these allegations, while a neighbor stated that she visited the victim every day for a month while the Kannans were abroad and obtained a front door key got.

They said her claim of being held captive in the Kannans’ home was “apparently contradicted” by photos of her with fellow Tamils ​​at Crown Casino, in Ballarat and Phillip Island, as she accepted attending temples and dance concerts and visited Sydney four times. time.

But the judges nevertheless ruled that “the preponderance of evidence would have justified the jury’s conclusion that the applicants were able to determine how she went about her daily life.”

They found that this included when and how she worked, when she slept, when she ate, and what she was paid, which they called a “sham wage.”

Judges Priest, Niall and Macaulay also felt it was open to the jury to discover that the Kannans retained the victim’s passport to verify her ability to leave the country.

They said the jury could have found “considerably” that the Kannans controlled the victim’s access to medical care.

“Her slide into serious ill health cannot have gone unnoticed by either of them, but no medical attention was sought for her until she had lost just 40kg and was found hypothermic and barely conscious in a pool of her own urine,” they wrote.

The Kannans’ appeal of their sentences was also rejected.

Kandasamy Kannan will be eligible for parole in July 2024, while Kumuthini Kannan will be eligible for parole in July 2025.