The former ear, nose and throat specialist, now 57, appeared in the NSW Supreme Court via video link on Monday when Chief Justice Tom Bathurst and Justices Robert Hulme and Robert Beech-Jones dismissed his appeal. Xie’s brother-in-law and newsagent Norman Lin, 45, his wife Lily Lin, 43, their sons Henry, 12, and Terry, 9, and Lily’s sister, Irene Lin, 39, were set upon in 2009 with what was said to be a hammer-like object in their Epping home, which was about 300 metres away from where Xie lived with his wife and child in North Epping.
In 2017 a jury found Xie guilty of the five murders and he was later sentenced to five life sentences after multiple aborted trials.In handing down her sentence, Justice Elizabeth Fullerton called the killings “heinous in the extreme”.
The court was told Xie appealed his convictions on eight grounds, three of which focused on evidence given by scientist Dr Mark Perlin concerning the likely contributors to a stain containing DNA from multiple people that was found in his garage during a police search in 2010.In Xie’s final trial prosecutors had argued the stain contained DNA from at least four members of the Lin family and in support of this led evidence from Dr Perlin, who used computer analysis to determine the likely contributors to the stain.Lawyers for Xie argued Dr Perlin’s evidence was erroneously admitted, but the three appeal judges said there was no merit in the objections raised and said many of the objections involved arguments that could have been raised at trial but were not. Xie’s legal team also argued there was a miscarriage of justice because of directions given to the jury by Justice Fullerton concerning Xie’s alibi.
Xie had told police that at the time of the killings he was asleep in bed with his wife, but the appeal court was not satisfied that any of the complaints raised under this ground had given rise to a miscarriage of justice. Justice Fullerton made a mistake in admitting evidence that he constructed a massage device that included a cloth covering bound by a rubber bad that was similar to a bloodied cloth found at the murder scene which prosecutors argued covered the murder weapon. The massage device was seized at Xie’s home and prosecutors argued the cloth and the device were sufficiently similar that they suggested whoever constructed the massage device had also placed the cloth found at the scene over the murder weapon.Xie was holding a pen but did not take notes as his bid for freedom was rejected, instead listening intently and covering his face with his hands when the eighth and final ground was dismissed.His wife stood by him and had maintained he was innocent.Prosecutors argued he was motivated by his perceived lowly status in the family.The trial also heard he had a sexual interest in Brenda Lin, the only family member to survive who was away on a school trip at the time of the killings.
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