An Indian national who killed the fiancée of her boyfriend in the couple’s Sydney unit will remain in jail after the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal rejected her appeal against the sentence.
28-year-old Purvi Joshi had been in Australia for less than a month when her dead body was found by her fiancé Niraj Dave with a knife stuck into her stomach, on 30th July 2013.
Manisha Patel who is currently serving a jail term of nine years and four months was found guilty by a jury in 2015 for murder and sentenced to 18 years in jail. However, her conviction was quashed in 2017 before subsequently being found guilty of manslaughter in March 2018.
Love triangle
Ms Patel and Mr Dave had been in a relationship since September-October 2011 and shared a unit for a number of months.
The court heard that Mr Dave met Ms Joshi in India in 2012 and during a subsequent visit to India in 2013, the couple decided they would marry.
Ms Patel also travelled to India with Mr Dave in January 2013 but was unaware of his meetings with Ms Joshi and their decision to marry. The court heard that during their flight back to Sydney, Mr Dave and Ms Patel stopped over in Dubai where they shared a hotel room and had sexual intercourse.
Later she told Mr Dave that she was pregnant and they got the pregnancy terminated in March 2013.
In May 2013, Mr Dave started living in a separate unit before Ms Joshi moved to Sydney from India in July. She met Ms Patel for the first time on 24th July.
Ms Patel claimed that Ms Joshi took her passport out of her handbag that night when Mr Dave was at his night security job, and demanded to know if something was going on between the two of them. She claimed she told Ms Joshi about the pregnancy to placate him and that Ms Joshi demanded documentary evidence in return for the passport.
However, the trial judge expressed “considerable reservation” in accepting her version, adding that she was a “proven and inveterate liar”.
When Mr Dave was still at work, Ms Patel went to his unit in the early hours of 30th July when Ms Joshi was alone and an altercation ensued between them.
Ms Patel claimed she had gone there to get her passport. However, the court concluded that in the absence of any reliable evidence, the reason for her going to Ms Joshi’s unit was unknown.
Ms Patel said she smothered Ms Joshi after she attacked her with a knife. She took the knife from Ms Joshi’s hand after she stopped resisting and stabbed her in the stomach.
She claimed she acted in self-defence but the court said while it’s not possible to be certain about why this crime occurred, it’s clear that Ms Patel killed Ms Joshi by “excessive use of force in defending herself from a knife attack”.
While the court said Ms Patel had good prospects of rehabilitation, it also noted that she had not demonstrated any remorse for her actions.
