A HUSBAND and wife jailed for dodging almost $1 million in taxes have won a Supreme Court challenge to have their sentences reduced.
In 2010, Nenad and Tania Dragojlovic, 54, of Lara, were found guilty of 20 counts of defrauding the Commonwealth after federal police discovered they were adjusting records of their company that hired out hundreds of labourers to work at Werribee South farms.
A jury found the pair guilty of evading $909,662 in taxes over four years from 1996 to 2000. Mr Dragojlovic was sentenced to five years and four months jail while Ms Dragojlovic was released on a good behaviour bond after 18 months.
Last Thursday, after Mr Dragojlovic had served two years of his jail term, his lawyers contested the jury’s guilty verdict and argued the sentences were excessive. The Supreme Court heard that nine years elapsed from when police first executed a search warrant to when the Dragojlovics were convicted in 2010, and that the original trial had lasted longer than a year because of regular disruptions.
Justices Robert Redlich, Mark Weinberg and Kevin Bell agreed to reduce the sentences because of the anxiety caused to the pair over a “protracted period”. But they said the 2010 jury had enough evidence to find the pair guilty of the charges beyond reasonable doubt.
The court heard the key to the case against the Dragojlovics had been the discovery of a red book, labelled “Dad’s folder” in their house. Crown prosecutors contended that the red book contained an accurate record of all payments made by their company.
Mr Dragojlovic’s sentence was reduced to four years.
