By Kristian Silva

MELBOURNE – A Melbourne man who killed his wife with a knife and an axe has been found guilty of murder, with a Supreme Court jury rejecting his story that he was acting in self-defence.

Nelomie Perera, 43, was found in a pool of blood after suffering 35 injuries to her head, face, neck and arms during a violent struggle with her husband Dinush Kurera.

Kurera walked away from the incident uninjured.

He later claimed he could not remember what happened after the first two swings of the axe, which he had brought to the victim’s house.

The father-of-two pleaded not guilty at trial, with his legal team arguing Perera was wielding a knife in a “murderous rage” and that Kurera did “what any person would do” to defend himself.

The murderer later told emergency services: “I kill my wife. She’s dead over there.”

After a five-week trial, it took a Supreme Court jury less than two hours of deliberations to return the guilty verdict.

The killing occurred in the couple’s home in the Melbourne suburb of Sandhurst on December 3, 2022.

The trial was told Kurera had a history of domestic violence and infidelity, and Perera made plans for a divorce when Kurera travelled to Sri Lanka earlier in the year.

He returned to Australia days before the killing and learned his wife had also taken out an intervention order barring him from living at the Sandhurst property, which was their family home.

Perera was in fear of her husband and was wearing a safety watch, which captured audio of her screams during the deadly attack.

Armed with the axe, a jimmy bar, and a can of petrol, Kurera broke into the property late at night through the back fence.

He ambushed his estranged wife, and after calming down for a few minutes, struck her again with the axe and stabbed her to death on the kitchen floor.

The start of Kurera’s attack was witnessed by the couple’s two teenage children, one of whom was also attacked with the axe by his father.

Kurera denied hurting his son, saying the teenager suffered head and knee injuries from falling over.

His decision to plead not guilty meant his children had to testify at the trial and recount how their father stormed the home and murdered their mother.

The couple’s daughter testified seeing Kurera stabbing and hitting Perera with the axe as she lay on the floor.

“I’m dead,” were Perera’s final words to her daughter

During days of cross-examinations, Kurera’s barrister John Desmond accused the children of lying and concocting a false story to put their father behind bars.

That was despite the children recounting what happened to neighbours and paramedics immediately after the incident.

“You have deliberately told lies,” Desmond said to the daughter.

“Disagree,” she responded.

The jury also found Kurera, now 47, guilty of assaulting his son with the axe.

Kurera now faces the prospect of decades behind bars and will face a pre-sentence hearing on November 8.

– abc.net.au