Man sentenced to 14 years jail for killing two women in 2022

ABC NEWS (Australia)

There has been an angry reaction after a man who killed two women in Melbourne was sentenced to just 14 years behind bars. The killer struck a deal to significantly reduce his sentence.

Transcript

00:00Hiding his face, Xia Zhenglin killed two women but could be released from jail in just seven

00:09years.

00:10To get such a short sentence for that just almost seems unbelievable.

00:16It's just not taking our life seriously.

00:20Lin brutally took the lives of two sex workers in these Melbourne CBD apartments in late

00:25December 2022.

00:27The first woman, Yuki Lo, was strangled to death inside her home.

00:32The second, Hyun Suk Jeon, was also killed within 24 hours.

00:36She was found inside days later with a towel wrapped around her head.

00:41Lin left the women to die, taking cash and bank cards to pay off his gambling debts.

00:48Today Ms Jeon's family was in court as the killer was sentenced to a maximum of 14 years

00:53for both deaths.

00:54She showed them no mercy.

00:56You have not expressed or displayed any remorse, Justice Stephen Kaye said.

01:01With time already served, 24-year-old Lin could be released as early as 2031.

01:07The main reason Lin's sentence was so low was the manslaughter plea deal that was struck

01:12with prosecutors.

01:13Lin was originally charged with murder, which would have carried a much heftier jail sentence.

01:19The community believed that again the system just failed us and not see our occupation

01:25as a job.

01:26Prosecutors are refusing to explain why they lowered the charges from murder to manslaughter,

01:30but the deal meant the case could progress quickly through the court system.

01:34We decriminalised sex work in this state so that women and sex workers would feel more

01:41confident about reporting crime.

01:43This sentence has sent the opposite message to them.

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