Leifer sentenced to 15 years for abuse that had a ‘devasting impact’

Judge found the abuse left the victims filled with shame, unable to trust others and subject to triggering attacks that required hospital treatment.

Malka Leifer’s behaviour towards Dassi Erlich and Elly Sapper was “predatory, undertaken for no better reason than her sexual gratification and has had a devastating impact on each victim”, a judge said in Melbourne yesterday.

In the Victorian County Court, Judge Mark Gamble sentenced the former school principal to 15 years in prison, with a non-parole period of 11 years and 6 months.

But Leifer, 56, is likely to spend a little over five years and six months in prison before being eligible for parole because she has already served 2069 days, just under six years, in detention in house arrest in Israel and in remand in Australia

In July, Leifer was convicted of 18 charges of rape and other sexual assaults against the sisters, conducted over four years in the early 2000s. She was acquitted of a series of other charges in relation to a third sister, Nicole Meyer.

Leifer was not in court for the sentencing but watched proceedings via a video link from prison.

Yesterday’s sentencing is the culmination of a case that stretches back to 2004, when Leifer started her sexual abuse of the sisters at the Adass School, an ultra-Orthodox school in Melbourne. The case became international after Leifer fled to Israel to avoid prosecution. Police this year reopened an investigation into Adass Israel board suspected of helping her escape.