Melbourne dad who murdered his wife in front of kids with an axe is jailed – after daughter’s devastating choice was revealed in court

A killer has been jailed for 37 years for murdering his wife with an axe in front of their teenage children, in what a judge has described as a brutal and horrific attack.

Dinush Kurera, 47, blinked and looked straight ahead as Victorian Supreme Court Justice Amanda Fox handed down his sentence on Thursday morning.

He will be eligible for parole after 30 years.

Kurera claimed he was acting in self-defence when he repeatedly stabbed his wife Nelomie Perera with an axe and knife at her Melbourne home on December 3, 2022.

But a jury rejected his story and in August found him guilty of murder after only three hours of deliberations.

Justice Fox described the fatal attack as brutal and horrific, saying Kurera had clearly been in a rage.

‘You were motivated by anger and saw everything of the prism of entitlement and ownership,’ she said in her sentence.

‘In your mind, Nelomie deserved to be killed for leaving you, excluding you from your house and seeing other men.’

Kurera’s teenage children witnessed the attack and his 16-year-old daughter even tried to stop him as he grabbed a knife.

The court heard she was forced to contemplate stabbing her father to save the life of her mother.

The audio had been captured on a special ‘safety watch’ issued to women who fear they might be at risk of harm from violent men. 

‘Suzy (not her real name) grabbed a black handled knife… to try and stop her father, by stabbing him,’ Crown prosecutor Mark Gibson KC said.

‘Suzy was too scared to actually stab him, and instead dropped the knife near the kitchen area.

‘Nelomie looked at Suzy and said, “I’m dead”.’

Her safety watch captured Suzy’s voice and Kurera telling her: ‘Go. I’ve got nothing to lose. Get out of here’.

Both children gave evidence at trial and described in victim impact statements how distressing the court process was.

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