Nelomie Perera had moved from Sri Lanka to Australia when she was 10 years old and had been married to her husband for 20 years – but she had enough of his abuse and adultery
Nelomie Perera, a 43 year old woman living in Melbourne, Australia, was left devastated after discovering her husband’s infidelity while he was away on business in Sri Lanka. Dinush Kurera, her husband of over 20 years, had been abroad for several months exploring hotel business opportunities when Nelomie found out about his affair.
The betrayal was particularly painful for Nelomie, who had already endured much in their relationship. Originally from Sri Lanka, Nelomie moved to Australia at the age of 10 and later had three children with Kurera, including a 17 year old son and a 16 year old daughter. Despite enduring her husband’s increasingly volatile temper and even showing signs of physical abuse, Nelomie chose to stay in the relationship for the sake of her children.
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However, after receiving information from multiple sources that Kurera had been seeing another woman during his frequent trips back to Sri Lanka, Nelomie decided to seize the opportunity of his absence to finally leave him.
She obtained a court order preventing Kurera from entering their family home, packed up his belongings and placed them in storage, and sent him a message stating, “I want a divorce. I am not going to live my life afraid of you any more.”
Despite Kurera’s denial of the affair and his claim that it was all “in her head”, Nelomie stood firm in her decision. However, she confessed to feeling more frightened than ever before, even telling the police that she believed her husband was capable of killing her.
She was assisted in changing the locks and provided with a personal safety watch, a service offered to those at risk of domestic violence. On 1 December 2022, Kurera returned to Australia where he was served with a court order at the airport, preventing him from returning home.
He was enraged when he was granted access to his belongings stored in a unit.
Two days later, on 3 December, Kurera purchased a crowbar and an axe from a hardware store. Dressed in dark attire, he broke into Nelomie’s home through the back fence using the crowbar.
He hid for approximately an hour armed with the axe and a can of petrol. At 11pm, Nelomie stepped out onto her back patio for a smoke and was ambushed by her estranged husband.
Her terrified screams alerted her teenage children. When her daughter rushed to help, she discovered her mum on the kitchen floor with a head injury and her dad looming over her with an axe.
The frightened girl pleaded with him to stop, but he seized a 30cm kitchen knife.
The daughter attempted to disarm him, but Kurera attacked Nelomie with both weapons. Nelomie’s son intervened courageously.
As he tried to seek help, Kurera pursued him with the axe, striking him three times – on the head, shoulder, and knee.
Both children threatened to call the police and summon an ambulance to save their mum, but Kurera warned them that if they did, he would douse the house in petrol and set it alight, killing everyone inside. He continued his brutal assault on Nelomie with the axe, stabbing her in the neck and upper body.
The horrific attack lasted approximately 14 minutes, with Nelomie’s safety watch capturing her final moments. Her heartbreaking last words to her daughter were, “I’m dead.”
As Kurera fled to the bathroom after soiling himself, the terrified children ran to seek help from their neighbours. The daughter pounded on a door, and chilling CCTV footage captured her screaming, “Dad’s killing Mum… I’m pretty sure she’s dead.”
When emergency services arrived at the scene, Kurera confessed to them that he had murdered his wife.
She was discovered in a pool of blood and could not be saved, having sustained 35 separate injuries to her head, face, neck, arms and abdomen.
When interrogated by the police, Kurera claimed he had killed Nelomie in self-defence after she attacked him, but upon examination, he was found to have no injuries. He also insisted that he remembered much of what had transpired.
Kurera maintained that he had visited the house with the intention of seeing his children and refuelling an empty petrol tank of a Ducati motorcycle located at the property. He denied any intention of harming Nelomie, despite having purchased a new black outfit, a crowbar, an axe and fuel earlier that day.
During his 2024 trial, Kurera confessed to killing his wife but insisted it wasn’t murder, a claim that forced his traumatised children to testify about the horrific attack. They recounted their desperate pleas for their dad to stop the attack and their powerlessness in saving their mother.
Kurera claimed self-defence, testifying he was compelled to grab an axe and strike Nelomie “a couple of times” after she lashed out at him with a knife and bit his finger during a row. He maintained that fear drove his actions.
The prosecution argued Kurera murdered his wife as she attempted to end their marriage, citing witnesses who recalled how, a decade earlier, Kurera had purportedly assaulted Nelomie.
In a distressing flashback to 2013, the court learned Nelomie once escaped to her parents’ house with her kids, alleging Kurera had attacked her with a hammer and trampled on her, leaving her bruised and barely able to walk. Despite her family’s pleas, Nelomie felt compelled to stay because of her children.
Chilling evidence revealed Nelomie’s final moments, with 19 desperate calls for help captured by her safety watch while she bled to death. Kurera’s remorseless attitude stunned everyone—prison phone recordings captured him saying, “She deserved this” and “Look what she made me do.”
After an intense four-week trial, the jury took just three hours to convict Kurera of murder and assaulting his son. The pre-sentencing hearing included poignant victim impact statements from Nelomie’s children.
The daughter, now 18, spoke of the immense trauma she feels, saying, “What happened will forever haunt me,” as images of her mother’s final moments continue to linger in her mind.
She fondly recalled her mother as her best friend, expressing grief over missing her mum during significant life events, like her recent Year 12 graduation. Kurera, during the statement, reclined smugly in his seat, smiling as the heartbreaking words were read aloud.
His grin persisted even as his son’s testimony was heard.
His son, now 19, revealed his fears about fatherhood, saying, “I was always told my whole life that I was like my father. I’m afraid if I have children I would treat them the same way. He is not my dad any more– he’s just another person.”
The judge noted there were 27 victim impact statements submitted to the court– none were on Kurera’s behalf. In December 2024, the 47-year-old was sentenced to 37 years in prison – 36 years for Nelomie and a year for his son. He’ll be eligible for parole in 30 years. The judge said the attack was horrific and spoke about the loved ones who felt like they’d failed Nelomie.
“They did everything they could,” she told Kurera. “No one but you is to blame for her death.”