Joseph Vella loses second bid to have conviction for murder of estranged wife Ruth at Kallaroo home overturned

A former insurance company employee who beat his ex-wife with a baseball bat then slit her throat in front of their young son more than 20 years ago has failed to have his conviction thrown out again. Joseph Vella, who was jailed for life with a 20-year non-parole period for brutal murder of the mother of his two children Ruth in March 2005, also tried to have every judge in the Supreme Court recuse themselves from hearing his application. He claimed they could not be impartial because his former lawyer Michael Bowden is now a sitting District Court judge and used the case of former barrister Lloyd Rayney, who was acquitted of murdering his estranged wife Corryn in 2012, as the basis for his request. Mr Rayney’s trial was heard before an interstate judge and the subsequent appeal was also heard in front of a coram of interstate judges. Vella also used the recent case of Tasmanian Supreme Court judge, Gregory Geason, who was found guilty of assaulting and emotionally abusing his former partner. In that matter all serving Tasmanian magistrates recused themselves and a magistrate from another state presided over the case. In his application, Vella claimed his then lawyer, Mr Bowden “mismanaged” his defence at trial by “wrongly” advising him and that he used “coercion, improper inducement, and unfair prejudicial tactics in the preparation and conduct of the trial.” At trial, Vella claimed his ex provoked him by saying he would never see his children again after he kicked his way into her Kallaroo house then bashed her head four times with a baseball bat then used a knife he recently bought and sharpened to cut her throat in front of their five-year-old son on December 29, 2003. He had been banned from being near her after she secured a violence restraining order following a horrific assault a month earlier where he pushed her into some stairs, causing her broken ribs and a punctured lung. After being found guilty of his estranged wife’s murder, Vella launched an appeal but it was dismissed. A change in the law two years ago has allowed offenders to launch more than one appeal but there has to be new fresh and compelling evidence. In his appeal application Vella claimed Mr Bowden did not adduce evidence that his now deceased wife had an affair and that was what provoked him. But in its decision, the three judges of the Court of Appeal, Justices Robert Mazza, Robert Mitchell and Sam Vandongen, dismissed his application saying not only was there no fresh and compelling evidence but also that his arguments were “fatally flawed” and “hopeless.” They also wrote his case was substantially different to that of Mr Rayney and Judge Geason. Mr Rayney’s matters, they said, were heard before interstate judges because Mrs Rayney was a Supreme Court Registrar at the time of her death. Judge Geason was a serving Supreme Court judge who matter was to be heard in a lower court before magistrate in the same judicial hierarchy. “These applications for leave to appeal were made without any realistic prospect of success,” they wrote. “They do no more than seek to call into question reasonable forensic choices made by defence counsel at trial via new and baseless accusations that he deliberately undermined the appellant’s defence of provocation. “The applications are so devoid of merit as to be tantamount to an abuse of process. Plainly, these proceedings should never have been commenced.”