Neelander Sirohi was sentenced to seven years and eight months in August 2015 for raping an intoxicated passenger in his cab and home. Earlier this year, he was deported to India upon his release on parole.
His victim was “extremely vulnerable” when she got in the cab as she had consumed alcohol and prescription medication. She was sexually assaulted in the cab and then taken to a property in Harrison, in Canberra’s north.
The victim told the police she had little memory of the incident.
Sirohi had initially pleaded not guilty and was released on bail but was later arrested at the Indian High Commission while attempting to get travel documents in order to flee Australia.
Just five days before his trial was to get underway, he pleaded guilty to two counts of sexual intercourse without consent.
Security upgrade had Sirohi kicked out of sex-offender program
35-year-old Sirohi’s racial discrimination claim relates to events which occurred when Sirohi was incarcerated in the ACT prison, the Alexander Maconochie Centre. From November 2017, Sirohi had started attending a sex-offender program which if completed, could have impacted the date he became eligible for parole.
But in January 2018 he was thrown out of the program after Sirohi’s security classification was upgraded as a result of his “involvement in an incident” with another detainee. Sirohi applied twice to be readmitted to the program, but his security classification prevented his reentry into the program.
Sirohi then filed a complaint with the ACT’s human rights commission, alleging racial discrimination for his exclusion from the program and said his mental health had worsened as a result.
After the HRC closed his case, it was referred to the ACT’s Civil and Administrative Tribunal. Sirohi asked the ACAT to order the prison authorities to issue him a certificate of completion of the sex-offenders program to show that he was rehabilitated.
However, the Justice and Community Safety Directorate of the ACT sought to have Sirohi’s application dismissed, saying it was “frivolous or vexatious” and “lacking in substance”.
While the Tribunal found that he may have genuinely felt aggrieved at being denied readmission to the sex-offender course, it said Sirohi failed to furnish any evidence other than his belief, that his race was the reason for his expulsion.
“The Tribunal is comfortably satisfied that the applicant’s expulsion and subsequent exclusion from [the sex-offender program] was based on his security classification and his behaviour. It did not constitute ‘unfavourable treatment’ or involve ‘the imposition of a disadvantage’,” Presidential Member Elizabeth Symons said.
The applicant has not put any material before the Tribunal, other than his subjective beliefs, that would support the Tribunal drawing an inference that his race (or immigration status) was the real reason or the true basis for the decisions to expel or exclude him from [the program].
The Tribunal also concluded that the program was not a service, for the purpose of the discrimination law.
It said Sirohi’s request for a certificate of completion to show he had been rehabilitated was not reasonable since he had not completed the course and did not identify any steps he had taken to demonstrate rehabilitation.
