Former surgeon Robert Xie to die in prison for massacre of Sydney’s Lin family

A Chinese-born former surgeon who bludgeoned to death five relatives has been jailed for life for one of Australia’s most ferocious killings.

Former ear, nose and throat specialist Robert Lian Bin Xie bashed to death two children and three adults with a “hammer like object” as they lay sleeping in their Sydney home in 2009.

The 58-year-old, who emigrated from China 15 years ago, was told he will die in jail for the murders of his newsagent brother-in-law Norman Min Lin, 45, Lin’s wife Lily Yun Li Lin, 43, their sons Henry, 12, and Terry,9, as well as Lily Lin’s sister Irene Li, 39. There is no possibility of parole.

Justice Elizabeth Fullerton told a Sydney court Xie’s horrific slaying of the five showed “resolve... to persist with the infliction of extreme violence”.

It was a “single episode of brutal and calculated murderous violence (and) a course of offending that can only be described as heinous in the extreme,” Fullerton said.

“There was a discernable pattern in the shape and contour of many of the blunt force injuries on the heads and faces of the victims.”

Prosecutors said Xie, who had a key to the family home in the suburb of North Epping, was motivated by bitterness linked to his lowly standing with the family. There was also a sexual motive that cannot be described due to court-imposed restrictions.