Mt Waverley couple slammed in court, sentenced to jail for keeping slave

A judge has unleashed on a “pitiless and heartless” husband and wife, who enslaved an elderly woman for eight years in their Mount Waverley home.

Mt Waverley couple Kandasamy and Kumuthini Kannan have been sentenced after keeping a woman as a slave. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Andrew Henshaw

A “pitiless and heartless” couple who kept an Indian grandmother enslaved in their suburban home for eight years has been sentenced to at least three years’ jail.

Kumuthini Kannan, 53, and her husband Kandasamy, 57, were in April found guilty of possessing and using the elderly woman as a domestic slave in their Mount Waverley home between 2007 and 2015.

Eight years after arriving in Australia on a 30-day tourist visa, authorities discovered the illiterate woman lying in a pool of urine, with no teeth, a dangerous sepsis infection and weighing just 40kg.

Ms Kannan was sentenced to a maximum eight years behind bars after Supreme Court judge John Champion found her more culpable than her husband who will serve a maximum of six years.

They will both be eligible for parole in four and three years respectively.

Justice Champion on Wednesday slammed the couple as “compulsive liars and deceptive individuals” who knowingly exploited the vulnerable woman while they continued to enjoy a lifestyle which included yearly overseas holidays.

The couple harboured a slave at home for eight years. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Andrew Henshaw

“You should be ashamed,” he told the couple.

Justice Champion said neither accused had ever expressed “a sense of sorrow or pity” about the “perilous” condition of their slave and both still believed they “had done nothing wrong”.

The landmark case is believed to be the first of its kind for the crime of domestic slavery ever heard in an Australian court.

During the 49-day trial, the slave – who cannot be named – told the court she was forced to work 23 hours a day, beaten with a frozen chicken, had boiling water poured over her legs and was only allowed to shower once a week.

The Kannan’s had been accused of locking the victim in their home for up to a month at a time while holidaying overseas and told the woman’s family to “get f---ed” when they asked for their mother to be allowed to return home to India.

Justice Champion said he could not sentence the couple on the grounds of any alleged mistreatment, rather only for the two counts of the “repugnant” offence of slavery.

The woman had twice come to Australia to work for the family and returned home, but on the third occasion her passport was taken from her and she was not allowed to leave.

Justice Champion accused the Department of Immigration of “missing in action” and said if they had followed up with the woman after her tourist visa expired, “the whole ugly scenario … might have been avoided”.

Kumuthini and Kandasamy Kannan have three children.

At an earlier plea hearing, defence lawyers argued the couple were charitable, caring people who worked with the elderly and homeless orphans.

Justice Champion said the references attesting to the couple’s past good character stood in stark contrast to the allegations of slavery.

He found the couple had repeatedly lied to police, social workers and doctors after the woman was rushed to hospital after collapsing in their home in July 2015.

“Telling the truth and being honest are concepts both of you appear to find elusive,” Justice Champion said.

In sentencing the husband and wife, Justice Champion took into account the exceptional circumstances of their children who will likely suffer as a result of their parents’ imprisonment.

“You set them a deplorable example of how parents should act towards another human being,” he said.

Justice Champion said modern-day slavery can be “more subtle” than the historic connotations of the offence.

“We must rid ourselves of the ingrained images of rows of men chained together … or men, women and children working in fields in bondage,”

“Possessing or using a slave is repugnant, degrading of the human condition and a gross breach of human rights,” Justice Champion said.