The 70-year-old Melbourne man will be 85 before he is released from a Balinese jail after being found guilty of abusing 11 girls aged between seven and 17 over a two-year period from 2014.
The court heard during the trial that Ellis lured his victims with money and presents and then took them to his Bali home and bathed and sexually assaulted them.
Yet Robert Andrew Fiddes Ellis has maintained he did not deserve to be imprisoned because his crime was “not a serious thing” and he “paid them generously”. In a press conference last week he said: “”Try and interview the girls if you can, try and interview the girls and see if they want me in here being punished,” he said.
His legal team says there is likely to be an appeal.
Head judge Wayan Sukanila sentenced Ellis to 15 years’ jail minus time already served and a fine of two billion rupiah ($200,000) or an additional six months’ jail. In sentencing, the judge said that Ellis had ruined his victim’s future and stained Bali’s image.
“”What he did can ruin the future of his child victims, they are the nation’s asset to build Indonesia one day,” the judge said.
“And secondly, his crime can stain Indonesia’s tourism image and especially Bali.”
Ellis has admitted that he may not be alive to see his release date. “Well, I am 70 now, 15 years would take me to 85. I don’t know if I’ll live that long,” he said to the waiting press.
Last week the Indonesian government announced a crackdown on paedophiles, with the parliament passing chemical castration laws , allowing judges to pass on this penalty for child sex offenders.
But Mr Ellis’s lawyer Yanur Nahak said that punishment could not apply in his case.
Under the new laws, child sex offenders could also be sentenced to death if found guilty.
