SINGAPORE: An Australian paedophile who was based in Singapore and sexually abused dozens of children around Southeast Asia has been jailed.

Boris Kunsevitsky was sentenced by a Melbourne court on Wednesday (Jan 29) to 35 years in prison, after he pleaded guilty to sexually abusing children for more than 15 years and producing child pornography material in which he induced children to have sex with other children.



Among his 47 child victims were five who resided in Singapore, where he lived until he was arrested in Australia in September 2017.

He pleaded guilty to 59 charges in total, including having sex with a child, making child pornography material, inducing a child to have sex with another child, persistent sexual abuse of a child, and importing child pornography material.

The 53-year-old will serve at least 28 years of his jail sentence before he is eligible for parole.



Boris Kunsevitsky had lived in Singapore and travelled around Southeast Asia abusing children. (Photo: Facebook/Nha khoa thẩm mỹ Smile Care)

“This sentence is comprised of the term of imprisonment for the two State charges, which was 11 years with a non-parole period of 8 years, plus the term of imprisonment for the Commonwealth charges, which was 24 years with a non-parole period of 20 years,” a spokesperson for the Supreme Court of Victoria said.

State charges refer to crimes committed in Victoria, Australia while Commonwealth charges relate to the crimes in the Philippines, Indonesia and Singapore.

Court documents showed Kunsevitsky had grown up in Russia and migrated to Australia with his family when he was 12. He moved to Singapore in the 2000s.

He was employed with local firm Esthemedica, where he was a director selling aesthetic equipment. The company previously told CNA it did not know of Kunsevitsky’s crimes.

MORE THAN 15 YEARS OF SEXUAL ABUSE

Court documents show his victims were aged between 10 and 17 years old, with the majority of the offences in the Philippines. He also abused children in Singapore and Indonesia.

Details of the children and others affected by the case have been redacted by the court.

His crimes date back to January 2001, when he had sex with a child under 16 in the Philippines.

Between September 2002 and August 2003, he had sex with a victim in Singapore, taking 17 photographs of the boy, who was about 12 to 14 years old at the time. This happened at Kunsevitsky’s home.

Police also found 28 photographs of another boy. These images, dated back to November 2002 when he was living in Singapore, and showed him committing sodomy and a boy performing oral sex on him.

The other victims in Singapore are not mentioned in court documents.

Among his multiple crimes, Kunsevitsky had maintained a sexual relationship with a child – who was between 13 and 15 years old at the time – in Melbourne between Jan 1, 2004 and Oct 31, 2005.

Between Jun 11, 2010 and Jun 16, 2011, and again between Feb 20, 2013 and Jun 11, 2013, Kunsevitsky engaged in “persistent sexual abuse” of five children outside of Australia.

Boris Kunsevitsky, 53, had sexually abused dozens of children. (Photo: Facebook/thammyquoctebally)

He also induced children to have sex with other children in his presence.

Between May 18, 2010 and Apr 28, 2015, Kunsevitsky created more than 1,000 photographs and videos depicting children engaged in sexual activity with each other, under his direction, or pictures and films of him sexually abusing the children.

On at least one occasion, he showed those pictures and videos to other children he also abused, and also distributed the images on the internet.

“The offender was a prolific traveller. In his police interview, he explained that he travelled extensively for work,” prosecutor Krista Breckweg said.

“Some of his offending occurred in Singapore, where he was based for most of the charged periods (January 2001 to September 2017).

“He also travelled regularly to the Philippines and to Indonesia, with most of the offending occurring in the Philippines. Often his trips to these Asian countries were brief and the arrival date coincided with the commencement of the offending.”

ARRESTED IN AUSTRALIA

His crimes went undetected until a victim was identified in 2016. German police had found 55 child pornography images of an Australian boy who was groomed and abused by Kunsevitsky.

An arrest warrant in Australia was issued, but it could not be executed because he was in Singapore.

On May 2017, charges were filed in Australia while he was overseas. Kunsevitsky was arrested when he returned to Australia on Sep 4, 2017.

Police officers found thousands of images and videos on a laptop and two hard drives, showing him sexually abusing children. The laptop and hard drives had been shipped over by Australian authorities from his home in Singapore.

Officers found a folder named “Jailbait”, where he kept subfolders labelled with his victims’ names. Jailbait is an informal word for someone who is perceived by some to be sexually attractive, but younger than the legal age of consent for sex.

Kunsevitsky, who was diagnosed with paedophiliac disorder after he was arrested, pleaded guilty in May last year to his crimes.

