Victorian dad who killed sons heads to High Court
A Victorian father twice found guilty of murdering his three sons by driving them into a dam is going to Australia's highest court today in a bid to appeal his conviction.
Robert Farquharson, 43, was jailed for life in 2010 after a Victorian Supreme Court jury found him guilty of murdering Jai, 10, Tyler, 7 and Bailey, 2, in September 2005 to get back at his ex-wife Cindy Gambino.
It was the second time he'd been convicted of his sons' Father's Day murders.
His appeal against the second conviction was rejected by the Victorian Court of Appeal in December but Farquharson has now gone to the High Court.
The full court will hear his application for special leave to appeal his conviction in Melbourne later today.
Farquharson was first convicted of murdering his sons in 2007 and sentenced to life without parole, but won an appeal and was granted a retrial.
After a second trial in 2010, he was sentenced to life in jail with a minimum term of 33 years.
Farquharson appealed against his conviction in May last year, arguing that a jury should have had the option of convicting him of manslaughter.
But Court of Appeal President Chris Maxwell and Justices Peter Buchanan and David Harper said it had been up to the jury to be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt of Farquharson's guilt.
They said the defence had not suggested at any stage during Farquharson's two trials that the jury should be directed to consider the alternative charge of manslaughter.
Farquharson was returning home with his sons from a Father's Day access visit when he drove his car off the Princes Highway and into the dam near Winchelsea in Victoria's southwest. While he swam free, his sons died.
