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‘Brazen’ killing of lawyer sees 2 men jailed
Two men will be imprisoned for more than two decades for the murder of a Sydney-based criminal lawyer.
Jerome Doraisamy
On Friday 25 February 2022, Justice Robert Allan Hulme of the Common Law – Criminal division of the Supreme Court of NSW sentenced Arthur Keleklio and Abraham Sinai for killing Ho Ledinh, a criminal lawyer who practised in Bankstown, Western Sydney.
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Mr Ledinh was 65 years old at the time of his death, and his criminal law clients “included persons involved in the illicit drug trade”, Hulme J noted.
In discussion of the potential motive for the killing, His Honour reflected that Mr Ledinh had an ownership interest in the Happy Cup café in Bankstown, and that he had told his wife that café co-owner Tri Van Nguyen (also a client) was a “big drug dealer” and that the café was used to launder money for Tri’s syndicate.
Hulme J further discussed evidence that Ledinh did not share proceeds of the sale of the café with Tri (while the latter was imprisoned on a drug charge), that he acted as a debt collector for Tri, and an instance in which Tri’s wife had given Ledinh $18,000, for which he said he would engage a barrister to have her husband released from prison, however, no barrister was engaged and the money was not returned.
The aforementioned evidence, together with other evidence given, was “incapable of establishing definitively a motive”, Hulme J said.
However, His Honour noted, “it seems to have been common ground that the murder had something to do with Mr Ledinh’s association with persons involved in quite serious criminality”.
The killing, Hulme J espoused, was “brazen in the extreme”.
On the afternoon of Tuesday 23 January 2018, Mr Ledinh was sitting at the Happy Cup café, and Mr Keleklio shot him three times, following which he died at the scene from blood loss.
Mr Sinai was implicated, His Honour listed, by virtue of his involvement in the planning of the killing, meeting with Mr Keleklio shortly before the shooting and providing him with “items and information of relevance”, and having in place for Mr Keleklio the means of fleeing the scene.
In sentencing the pair, Hulme J said that Mr Sinai – who was found guilty by a jury last year – is to be sentenced to 30 years with a non-parole period of 22 years and six months, while Mr Keleklio – who pleaded guilty – is to serve 27 years with a non-parole period of 20 years and three months.
Mr Keleklio’s sentence would also have been 30 years, His Honour noted, but for his guilty plea.
The victim impact statements, delivered by Mr Ledinh’s wife and daughters, “serve to reinforce the extreme gravity of the crime of murder and how the tragic and untimely loss of life can have a harmful effect upon those who were close to the deceased and upon the wider community as well”, His Honour mused.
The case is R v Keleklio; R v Sinai [2022] NSWSC 62.
