Director of Public Prosecutions v Lin
[2024] VSC 685
•7 November 2024
| IN THE SUPREME COURT OF VICTORIA | Not Restricted |
AT MELBOURNE
CRIMINAL DIVISION
S ECR 2023 0253
| DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS | Crown |
| v | |
| XIAOZHENG LIN | Accused |
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JUDGE: | KAYE JA |
WHERE HELD: | Melbourne |
DATE OF HEARING: | 28 October 2024 |
DATE OF SENTENCE: | 7 November 2024 |
CASE MAY BE CITED AS: | DPP v Lin |
MEDIUM NEUTRAL CITATION: | [2024] VSC 685 |
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CRIMINAL LAW – Sentence – Two charges of manslaughter by unlawful and dangerous act – Guilty plea – Accused killed two sex-workers within space of 24 hours – Victims killed in their homes – Unable to determine cause of death in respect of one victim due to body’s state of decomposition – Post-offence conduct – Accused stole money and belongings from victims – Accused Chinese citizen in Australia on expired student visa – Liable to be deported on completion of sentence – Difficult circumstances in custody – Youth – No previous convictions.
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APPEARANCES: | Counsel | Solicitors |
| For the Prosecution | Ms K Churchill Ms S Locke | Solicitor for Public Prosecutions |
| For the Accused | Mr P J Smallwood Mr J Cleveland | Fumens Lawyers |
HIS HONOUR:
Xiaozheng Lin, you have pleaded guilty to two separate charges of manslaughter committed by you in late December 2022.
The first charge, to which you have pleaded guilty, is the manslaughter of Yuqi Luo at Melbourne on 27 December 2022. Secondly, you have pleaded guilty to the manslaughter of Hyun Sook Jeon at Docklands on a date between 27 December and 28 December 2022.
For the purposes of sentencing you, I shall first outline the circumstances in which those two offences were committed by you. For that purpose, I am reliant principally on the summary of prosecution opening that was filed on your plea, and also on the depositions in the committal proceeding.
The victim of the first charge, Yuqi Luo, was born on 1 January 1991. She grew up in Hunam Province in China, and migrated to Australia in September 2018. At the time of her death she was living in an apartment in Latrobe Street, Melbourne.
The victim of the second charge, Hyun Sook Jeon, was born in South Korea on 3 August 1971. She moved to Australia in 2013. At the time of her death Hyun Sook Jeon was residing in an apartment in Docklands.
In December 2022, both Yuqi Luo and Hyun Sook Jeon were sex workers who operated their individual businesses in their home apartments.
On the evening of 26 December 2022, your friend, Zixiu Lin picked you up from your home in Greville Street, Huntingdale, and, at your request, he drove you to a brothel in Oakleigh South. You arrived there at about 9:20 pm and then departed at 10:10 pm. Subsequently, on the same evening, you arranged for Zixiu Lin to drive you to the premises of another prostitute. For that purpose, you called a booking agent, who directed you to the premises of Yuqi Luo in Latrobe Street, Melbourne. While Zixiu Lin was driving you to that address, you told him that you had recently lost money at the TAB, and that you were intending to rob the sex worker.
You arrived at Yuqi Luo’s apartment shortly before 12.30 am. After you had entered the apartment, you had a shower, and you then had consensual sex with Yuqi Luo. Following that, while you were both still in bed, you requested Yuqi Luo for oral sex. She declined to provide that service to you unless you paid an additional fee. As a consequence, you became angry, and an argument ensued between you and Yuqi Luo, in the course of which you grabbed hold of her. You wrapped your arm around her neck and pressed her head into the bed. You told her not to yell, and that you would not hurt her. When she continued to call out, you pressed her head hard into the bed for about one minute. At some stage during the incident, she bit you on the arm, and, in response, you retaliated by hitting and pushing her head.
After about one minute, you ceased your assault on Yuqi Luo. At that point, she was lying on the bed, gasping for air. At some stage after that, she died as a result of asphyxiation that was caused by your actions in compressing her neck.
In the meantime, you had another shower in the apartment. You then looked through the apartment, and removed from it approximately $7,000 in cash, which included the money that you had paid to Yuqi Luo, together with her mobile telephone and tablet, and several handbags. You placed those items in a laundry basket, and covered it with a piece of fabric. You then departed from the premises, carrying the basket with you, and walked to Zixiu Lin’s vehicle that was parked in A’Beckett Street. You placed the laundry basket on the back seat and got into the vehicle, which then departed.
While you were in the car, Zixiu Lin asked you if you had robbed the sex worker. You responded that you had done so. You told Zixiu Lin that you had had sex with Yuqi Luo, that you had hit her, and that you had taken her bag, mobile phone and money. You also told Zixiu Lin that, in the course of the assault, Yuqi Luo had bitten you on the hand. You said that when you left her premises, Yuqi Luo was able to move and that she was alive.
In the course of the journey, Zixiu Lin stopped the vehicle, and you disposed of Yuqi Luo’s mobile telephone. He then drove you to his home in Box Hill where you ate a meal, following which he drove you to your home in Greville Street, Huntingdale where you arrived at about 3:15 am. When you got out of the vehicle, you took with you the laundry basket containing Yuqi Luo’s belongings.
Later on the same day, an associate of Yuqi Luo gained access to her apartment. When she entered it, she discovered Yuqi Luo’s deceased body in the first bedroom, and as a consequence, the police were contacted.
On 28 December 2022, Dr Paul Bedford, a specialist forensic pathologist, conducted an autopsy on the body of Yuqi Luo. On examination, Dr Bedford noted numerous bruises and abrasions involving the eyes, ears, cheeks, lips, neck and skull. He also noted conjunctival petechiae. Those findings were consistent with, and demonstrated, that Yuqi Luo had died as a result of asphyxiation caused by your actions in compressing her neck.
I turn, then, to the circumstances in which you committed the manslaughter of Hyun Sook Jeon.
Between approximately 10:15 pm and 10:45 pm on 27 December 2022, you travelled in a commercial passenger vehicle from your home in Greville Street, Huntingdale to the premises of Hyun Sook Jeon in Waterside Place, Docklands, where you engaged in consensual sex with her. At some point, you assaulted her in a manner that was both unlawful and dangerous, and which caused her death. Having done so, you departed from her premises, taking with you a number of items of her personal property, namely, her laptop, her Commonwealth Bank and ANZ bank cards, her mobile telephone, the keys of her motor vehicle and the keys to her building, and other personal items. You left her premises at about 12:37 am and caught an Uber to your home in Greville Street, Huntingdale.
At some point, shortly after leaving Ms Jeon’s apartment, you inserted the sim card from her mobile telephone into your own handset, and by doing so you made a number of purchases using her bank cards. Subsequent investigations by police revealed that, between 1:25 am and 7:10 pm on 28 December, you undertook some thirty transactions, or attempted transactions, using those bank cards, which in total amounted to the sum of almost $17,000.
Later, on the same date, you put the backpack, that contained Ms Jeon’s laptop, bank cards, mobile phone, sim card and keys, in the rubbish bin of neighbouring premises in Greville Street. On the next morning, on 29 December 2022, your neighbour found the backpack in his recycling bin. He removed it, and contacted Homicide Squad detectives about it. When the backpack was examined, the items belonging to Ms Jeon were located in it.
On the following day, 30 December 2022, police attended, and gained access to, Ms Jeon’s apartment in Waterside Place. They located the deceased body of Hyon Sook Jeon Jeon lying face down on the bed. Her body was mostly covered with a blanket, and towels were wrapped around her head. A forensic examination of the apartment revealed your fingerprints in various locations.
On the same day, police executed a further search warrant on your premises. In the course of the search, a rubbish bin was located which contained some items that you had taken from Yuqi Luo’s premises, and a handbag that belonged to Hyun Sook Jeon.
On 31 December 2022, Dr Yeliena Baber, a specialist forensic pathologist, conducted an autopsy on the body of Hyun Sook Jeon. On examination, Dr Baber found that there had been significant decompositional changes to the body, so that it was not possible to detect any obvious injuries or pathology which were the cause of her death. Accordingly, the cause of death was noted to be unascertained. Dr Baber did not identify any natural disease which might have caused death, but she noted that the examination was limited by the extent of decomposition.
In the meantime, on 29 December, in company with your uncle Yun Chen, you presented yourself at Preston Police Station, where you were arrested in relation to the death of Yuqi Luo. You were then transported to Melbourne West Police Station where you participated in a recorded interview with police.
In the course of the interview, you made a number of admissions to assaulting Yuqi Luo and stealing items of property from her. When asked what had occurred, you said that after you had had sex with Yuqi Luo, you asked her for oral sex, and she said that she would charge you another $100 for that service. You said that that made you quite angry, particularly because, before you attended her apartment, she had changed the location at which you were to meet her two or three times.
You told police that you considered that Yuqi Luo’s attitude was “pretty bad”, that you were then under the influence of alcohol and that you felt humiliated, and as a result you started to use force. You said that Yuqi Luo then fought back. While you could not remember the exact details of the fight, you said that you “told her to be quiet with my hand”. You said that you pressed her “there” (indicating that you had pressed her on the back of the neck with your hand) and told her not to yell. When she continued to yell, you “pressed hard… for about one minute”. You said that she was breathing heavily, and you got out of the bed and had a shower, after which you removed items of her property and left the premises. You said that when you left the apartment, Yuqi Luo was lying at the side of the bed. You said that you checked her breathing, she was gasping for air, but you did not kill her, and that is what you then thought.
Following the interview, you were charged with the murder of Yuqi Luo.
In the meantime, police continued their investigations concerning the death of Hyun Sook Jeon. Those investigations revealed the transactions that you had undertaken on 28 December using Ms Jeon’s ANZ and CBA bank cards, and in which you had inserted her sim card into your handset to assist with those transactions on the bank cards.
On 30 January 2023, you were interviewed by police in relation to the murder of Hyon Sook Jeon. You exercised your right not to answer any of the questions put to you. You were charged with the murder of Hyun Sook Jeon, and you were remanded in custody.
Subsequently, on 24 October 2023, after a contested committal proceeding in respect of the two charges of murder, you were committed to stand trial on both charges. On 5 April 2024, you were served with a trial indictment on which you were charged with the two offences of murder. A trial was listed to commence on 5 August 2024.
In the meantime, on 2 July 2024, you made an offer to plead guilty to two charges of manslaughter. The prosecution accepted that offer. Accordingly, on 9 July 2024 you were arraigned and pleaded guilty to the two charges of manslaughter.
By your pleas of guilty to both charges, you have admitted each of the elements of the two offences of manslaughter that are the subject of the charges. In each case, it is alleged that you committed the offence of manslaughter, by causing the death of Yuqi Luo and of Hyun Sook Jeon respectively by an unlawful and dangerous act. Specifically, it is alleged that, in each case, you caused your victim’s death by an unlawful assault, which involved the use by you of such a degree of force, that a reasonable person, in your position, would have realised that you were exposing your victim to an appreciable risk of serious injury.
In the case of charge 1, you have admitted to causing the death of Yuqi Luo by assaulting her, and, in particular, by striking her on the head, compressing her neck and forcing her head face down onto a pillow in circumstances in which she was asphyxiated, being circumstances, which, plainly, were such that a reasonable person, in your position, would have realised that you were exposing her to a significant risk of serious injury.
The circumstances, in which you committed the offence, that is the subject of charge 2, are not known. By your plea you have admitted that you carried out an assault on Hyun Sook Jeon which was dangerous in the manner that I have just described, that is, an assault, which a reasonable person in your circumstances, would have realised was exposing Hyun Sook Jeon to an appreciable risk of serious injury.
The offence of manslaughter, to which you have pleaded guilty, is a most serious offence, for which the maximum sentence is 25 years imprisonment. By your violent and criminal actions, you have taken the lives of two innocent fellow human beings, Yuqi Luo and Hyun Sook Jeon. In each case, there were a number of factors that aggravated the seriousness of your offending.
At the time of their deaths, your two victims, Yuqi Luo and Hyun Sook Jeon, were each in their own homes, where they were entitled to feel safe. By admitting you to their homes, they entrusted you with their safety, and they were entirely vulnerable and defenceless. They were each clearly overwhelmed by the degree of force with which you assaulted them. In each case, your assault on your victim was unprovoked, and without any justification at all.
When you departed from the premises of Yuqi Luo, she was, at the least, in a very distressed physical state, gasping for air. You did not render her any assistance, or attempt to organise any assistance for her. In departing from the premises of each of the two women, you left them lying in a state, and in positions, that had no respect or regard for their personal dignity.
Your offending in each case was further aggravated by your conduct in stealing valuable items and money that belonged to the two women. As each of them lay helpless, and, at the least, in a severely debilitated state, in their own homes, you showed them no mercy, and you evinced no consciousness of the enormity of what you had just done to them. Instead, you callously set about taking from them, not only their personal safety and dignity, but also their valuable personal belongings.
In those circumstances, in each case, the offence committed by you was a particularly serious instance of the crime of manslaughter. The objective gravity, and your own personal subjective culpability, for each of the two offences, was high.
In addition, the fact, that your fatal assault on Hyun Sook Jeon took place within one day of your violent assault of Yuqi Luo, has the effect of further aggravating the seriousness of, and your moral culpability for, the offending that is the subject of the second charge. Having assaulted Yuqi Luo in circumstances in which you left her, at the least, stricken and gasping for breath as you left her apartment in Latrobe Street, you plainly suffered no pang of conscience, nor did you give any thought to the seriousness of the offending in which you had just engaged. Rather, undeterred by the harm you had just caused to Yuqi Luo, just one day later, you engaged in a further unlawful and serious assault on another harmless and defenceless woman, Hyun Sook Jeon, in what should have been the safety of her own home.
It is in those circumstances that, by your violent and criminal actions, you have taken the lives of two innocent fellow human beings.
At the time of her death, Yuqi Luo was just 31 years of age. Yuqi Luo was plainly a much loved member of her family. I have read the victim impact statement of her father, Luo Bonan, and on your plea it was read aloud in Court. While Yuqi Luo was the primary victim of your offending, that was the subject of charge 1, it is clear that her parents are also real victims of it. Yuqi Luo was a much loved daughter of her parents, and as they grew older it was intended that her role was to care for and provide for them in later life, as is the tradition in China. I have no doubt that the profound sorrow and anguish that you have caused to Yuqi Luo’s family will always remain with them.
At the time of her death, Hyun Sook Jeon, was 51 years of age. She was born in South Korea and came to Australia in 2013, where she met and married her husband Warren Punshon. I have read the moving victim impact statement of Mr Punshon. It describes the touching circumstances in which he met and married Hyun Sook Jeon, and the deep grief and irreparable sense of loss that he has suffered, and will continue to suffer, as a result of her death, and the cruel circumstances in which it occurred.
The victim impact statements are relevant, because they are an important reminder of the significant grief and suffering that has been, and will continue to be, suffered by others as a direct consequence of the unlawful killing by you of both Yuqi Luo and Hyun Sook Jeon. Your sentences are to be based on a proper analysis of the facts and the application of relevant sentencing principles. However, in applying those principles, it is important to keep in mind the serious effects of the crimes that you have committed, and the profound hurt and grief that has been, and will continue to be, suffered by many as a consequence of them.
For the reasons I have discussed, the two offences of manslaughter, to which you have pleaded guilty, are serious instances of that criminal offence. In order to consider the mitigating factors, that were relied on in your plea, I turn, then, to matters relating to your background.
You were born in China in October 2000, and you grew up in the Province of Haikou where your parents live. You are the only child in your family. While your parents were not wealthy, your family lived in comfortable circumstances, and you attended a local primary school in your village.
A prominent feature of your life, from an early age, was your involvement in gambling. You were first exposed to gambling when you were about six or seven years of age, when your mother would take you to the village’s cultural centre, where she would play mah-jong with other women. While you were there, you were permitted to play slot machines, using coins given to you by your mother. In doing so, you had some small wins, and your mother would praise you for your good fortune. You gained some kudos from her, and other adults at the centre, for the luck that you brought to them in their gambling. You were encouraged to gamble with other people’s money, and if you won, you would share the profit with them.
When you were about twelve years of age your family’s circumstances suffered a substantial set back. Your mother had invested the family savings in a coal mining enterprise, and that enterprise collapsed when government regulations changed. As a result, your family’s savings were lost, and your family experienced significant financial strain as a result. Your father began to drink heavily, and the relationship between your parents deteriorated.
At the same time, you suffered a serious injury playing basketball, when your femur became detached from your pelvis. You underwent major orthopaedic surgery, but, as a result of the injury, you were left walking with a limp. Your transition to middle school had been interrupted by the injury, and when you returned to school, you were taunted in respect of your limp. Your family was also ostracised because of their poverty.
It is in those circumstances that your gambling habit increased. You began to gamble more frequently and in larger amounts, and, in doing so, you lost substantial amounts of money. At the same time, your engagement with your education at school declined, and you were getting poor results in your classes. As a consequence, you were not able to study at an academically orientated high school, but instead you went to a vocational college in which you learned welding and smouldering skills.
In about June 2018 you came to Australia on a student visa. You were then 17 years of age. You came to Australia with the encouragement of your family, who thought that it would lead to you having better prospects in your life.
After arriving in Australia, you obtained some work on a construction site, where you worked principally as a plasterer’s assistant and labourer. You also enrolled in an English language course in the Melbourne CBD.
Shortly after arriving in Australia, you visited a sex worker. As a result of your limp, you had become self-conscious about your physical appearance. You had also suffered sexual abuse by a neighbour when you were young. As a result, your principal sexual outlet was through your attendance on sex workers. You commenced visiting them several times each month. At the same time, you were gambling heavily, and as a result you incurred substantial debts. Your uncle offered to assist you to repay the debts on the condition that you ceased to gamble. For a short time you were able to resist the temptation to gamble, but unfortunately, in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, you relapsed and continued to gamble.
In December 2022, you were living with a cousin and his girlfriend in the premises in Huntingdale, and you were carrying out plastering work at a building site in Geelong. At the same time, your gambling had increased to the level that it was completely out of control.
It is in that context that you committed the two offences, to which you have pleaded guilty. Your counsel, Mr Smallwood, correctly recognised that the circumstances in which you were living, and your heavy gambling addiction, are not mitigating circumstances. Rather, they provide the context in which your offending occurred.
As I have discussed, your offending in each instance was particularly serious. There are limited mitigating circumstances available to you.
The principal such circumstance consists of your plea of guilty to each of the two charges.
Although those pleas could not be described as early pleas, nevertheless they were made in the context of two serious charges of murder, in respect of which you had been committed to trial. As the prosecution has correctly accepted, in each case, the pleas are of genuine utilitarian value, particularly in respect of charge 2, in circumstances in which the prosecution has not been not able to directly establish the cause of death of Hyun Sook Jeon. In each case, the plea reflects your acceptance of responsibility for your criminal offending, and your willingness to facilitate the course of justice. In addition, the pleas provide some degree of closure for the families and loved ones of your two victims.
In addition, you have no previous criminal history, and, most relevantly, there is no previous history of you engaging in any violent behaviour. Accordingly, you are to be sentenced on the basis that, before your offending in the present case, you were otherwise of good character.
As I have noted, at the time of the offences, you were 22 years of age, and you are now 24 years old. In a case such as this, in which the offending was particularly serious, the weight, that is ordinarily accorded to an offender’s youth as a mitigating factor, is reduced, in order that appropriate weight be given to the sentencing purposes of general deterrence and denunciation. Nevertheless, your youth, both at the time of the offending, and at the time of sentence, is a relevant consideration in mitigation of your sentence.
It is also apparent that your time in custody has been, and will continue to be, somewhat more difficult than it is for other prisoners. You have a most limited facility in the English language. During the time in which you have been in custody in the Metropolitan Remand Centre, you have been able to speak to a few prisoners, who also are fluent in the Mandarin language, but, understandably, your opportunity to converse with others who speak your language has been, and will be, quite limited. You have had very few visits from your uncle, although you have been able to have quite regular contact with your parents in China.
Finally, it is accepted by both sides that it is inevitable that, on completion of your term of imprisonment, you will be deported. You are not an Australian citizen, and your student visa had already lapsed before you committed the two offences for which you are to be sentenced. As I have discussed, you originally came to Australia hoping to be able to develop prospects for a better life than you might have had in your home country. As a result of your offending, those prospects have been rendered entirely nugatory. I am therefore prepared to accept that, in those circumstances, the prospect of deportation is, to a limited extent, a further mitigating factor in this case.
In determining your sentence, I am required to take into account current sentencing practices. For any criminal offence, the range of factors, relating to the offending itself, and the circumstances of the particular offender, vary significantly, so that it is never a simple task to identify the appropriate range of sentence. That is particularly so in cases involving the offence of manslaughter, which, it is the experience of the courts, can and does occur in an infinite variety of circumstances.
Nevertheless, and bearing in mind those limitations, I do take into account the sentences imposed in the two cases, to which the prosecution has helpfully referred me, namely, the decision of the Court of Appeal in DPP v Tiumalu[1] and the sentence imposed by Incerti J in DPP v Wang (No 2)[2]. Neither of those cases are similar to, or comparable with, the present case. However, a review of them has given me some assistance in identifying the appropriate sentencing range for the offences, to which you have pleaded guilty in this case. In that respect, it is, of course, important to bear in mind that current sentencing practices are just one of many factors, which must be taken into account in determining the sentences to be imposed upon you.
[1][2024] VSCA 124.
[2][2020] VSC 884.
The principles, that apply to the determination of your sentence, are well established. It is necessary that the sentence, which I impose, be such as to adequately express the condemnation by this Court, and by the community, of the serious degree of violence in which you engaged against two defenceless women, Yuqi Luo and Hyun Sook Jeon, which cost them their lives, and to uphold the value which our society properly places on each individual human life.
It is also important that the sentences be of sufficient severity so as to provide a clear lesson to other persons, who might otherwise be minded to commit acts of violence against women, including those involved in the occupation that was undertaken by Yuqi Luo and Hyun Sook Jeon at the time of their deaths. It is important that such persons understand that, if they choose to engage in gratuitous acts of serious violence, such as those committed by you, they can expect to be deprived of their freedom to live in society for a substantial period of time. It is by that means that this Court can, so far as it is possible to do so, protect other women from the kind of fate which befell your two victims in this case.
In addition, it is important that the sentence be sufficient to ensure that you personally are deterred from any further such wrongdoing. In the present case, while you have accepted responsibility for the deaths of Yuqi Luo and Hyun Sook Jeon, you have not expressed, or displayed, any remorse for doing so. In those circumstances, I could only assess your prospect of rehabilitation as being reasonable.
In sentencing you on the two charges, it is necessary that there be a material measure of cumulation between the sentences, in order to reflect the circumstance that the two offences committed by you were separate and serious instances of the crime of manslaughter. In that respect, it is, equally, important that the sentences imposed, and the degree of cumulation of those sentences, be such that the total effective sentence does no more than reflect the totality of your offending, taking into account and giving proper weight to the mitigating factors that I have discussed.
In summary, for the reasons I have explained, each of the two offences of manslaughter, committed by you in this case, were serious instances of that criminal offence. There were a number of aggravating features of the offending, including that each of your two victims were vulnerable, you fatally assaulted them in their own homes, and, having done so, you callously gave them no assistance, but, instead, you stole valuable personal belongings from them. The fact that you fatally assaulted Hyun Sook Jeon, just 24 hours after you had brutally suffocated Yuqi Luo, is a further aggravating feature of the offence that is the subject of charge 2.
On the other hand, I have also taken into account the mitigating circumstances which I have discussed, and which include your plea of guilty, your previous good character, your youth, the difficulties that you will experience while you are in custody, and the fact that, on completion of your sentence, you will be deported from this Country.
Taking those matters into account, I sentence you as follows:
(a) On charge 1 (the manslaughter of Yuqi Luo) I sentence you to 9 years’ imprisonment.
(b) On charge 2 (the manslaughter of Hyun Sook Jeon) I sentence you to 10 years’ imprisonment.
I direct that 4 years of the sentence on charge 1 (the manslaughter of Yuqi Luo) be served cumulatively on your sentence on charge 2 (the manslaughter of Hyun Sook Jeon). Thus, your total effective sentence is 14 years’ imprisonment. I direct that you serve a minimum of 9 years’ imprisonment before you become eligible for parole.
Pursuant to s 18(4) of the Sentencing Act I declare that the period of 679 days (not including the date of today) be reckoned as already served under the sentence which I impose. I shall cause a notation to be made in the records of the Court that that declaration was made.
As I have discussed, I have taken into account, in your favour, the fact that you have pleaded guilty to each charge. For the purposes of s 6AAA of the Sentencing Act, but for your pleas of guilty I would have imposed a sentence of 11 years’ imprisonment on charge 1 and 12 years’ imprisonment on charge 2, and would have directed that 5 years of the sentence on charge 1 be served cumulatively on your sentence on charge 2. Thus, but for your pleas of guilty, your total effective sentence would have been 17 years’ imprisonment, with a minimum non parole period of 12 years before you become eligible for parole.
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