Indonesia jails Australian man for 15 years for molesting girls.
70-year-old Australian Robert Andrew Fiddes Ellis tells reporters outside court he bathed young girls in Bali before 'generously' paying them off.
Australian paedophile Robert Andrew Fiddes Ellis has been sentenced to 15 years' jail after being found guilty of persuading children to commit an indecent act.
The 70-year-old Victorian last week insisted he did not deserve to be imprisoned because his crime was "not a serious thing" and he "paid them generously".
Ellis, who sexually abused 11 girls aged under 18 between 2014 and 2015, requested a brief moment to pray before his sentencing started on Tuesday.
Australian paedophile Robert Ellis prays before his sentencing in Denpasar District Court on Tuesday.
Head judge Wayan Sukanila sentenced Ellis to 15 years' jail minus time already served and a fine of two billion rupiah (NZD$215,210) or an additional six months' jail.
He said aggravating factors included that Ellis had damaged the children's future and children were a human resource to build Indonesia in the future.
Judge Sukanila said Ellis had also damaged the image of Bali as a tourist destination, which could lead to a decrease in income for Indonesia.
Accused Australian paedophile Robert Andrew Fiddes Ellis talks to reporters in a courtroom in Bali.
Mitigating factors were that Ellis had admitted his guilt, felt remorse and had never been convicted before.
Ellis said via his lawyer he objected to the sentence and would appeal.
The Australian, who appeared dazed by the sentence, said outside court: "I am 70 now, it will take me to 85. I don't know if I will live for that long."
Prosecutors claimed Ellis admitted to the digital anal penetration of some of the girls while bathing them in his rental property in the Bali town of Tabanan, where he had lived since 2013.
Former Victorian police officer Glen Hulley, whose anti-child sex exploitation organisation Project Karma helped facilitate Ellis' arrest, said he was satisfied with the sentence.
He wrote on Project Karma's Facebook page last week that Ellis had been grooming children in the streets of Tabanan for years, often buying toys or food for children as young as four.
"Robert Andrew Ellis, you are a child sexual predator who indulged your urges for many years undetected before we caught up with you," Hulley wrote.
"You are a vile, despicable human being who shows no sign of remorse for your actions. It's offensive that you continue to portray to the court and the media that you are some caring old man who was just helping some poor children, whom you claim have been paid for their "inconvenience" and that they love you and miss you and that they don't want to see you punished.... "
Ellis told reporters last week he would give the girls a "mandi", the Indonesian word for bath. He said they would negotiate a price of 200,000 to 300,000 rupiah ($20-30) if the girls had a bath.
"If you don't want it that's ok," Ellis said he told them. He denied having "sexual relations" with any of the girls.
Asked if the parents had been aware of what was going on, Ellis said: "The parents know now but they didn't know before."
Referring to the girls he abused as his "friends", Ellis said: "I haven't murdered anybody and none of my friends want me in prison I am sure of that. None of them want me in here."
Indonesia has recently passed legislation that would allow judges to impose chemical castration for child sex offences.
However this did not apply to Ellis as the legislation is not retrospective and prosecutors had instead requested 16 years' jail.
Bali Police Chief Sugeng Priyanto told Fairfax Media the community became suspicious because of the number of children who visited Ellis's home.
"It aroused the people to wonder, suspect what was really happening there, were they really there to play, or were there other unusual activities?".
Sugeng said the case was a very serious one because the victims were children.
"The targets, the victims in paedophilia cases are children, teenagers, they are the hope, the future of each nation. If they are victims when they are children, in a wider sense it can be seen as crippling a generation, it can't happen, we can't allow it to happen."
- Sydney Morning Herald
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