Bhubaneshwar, India - A man convicted of murdering Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two sons in India six years ago has had his death sentence reduced to life imprisonment.
Seven other men convicted of the murders in January 1999 were ordered released during the appeal court hearing in Bhubaneshwar.
Graham Staines and his sons were burnt to death by a mob of Hindu fanatics who accused him of forcibly converting poor Hindus in Orissa to Christianity.
The three were asleep in their jeep in Manoharpur village in eastern Orissa state when the attack took place. They tried to escape the flames but the mob, armed with axes, prevented them from leaving.
Despite the tragedy, his widow Gladys Staines stayed on in India with her daughter Esther, overseeing the completion of a hospital for leprosy patients in Orissa before returning to Australia.
After a trial lasting nearly 2½ years, a court convicted 13 men in September last year.
The alleged ringleader, Dara Singh, was sentenced to death and the others to life imprisonment.
Appeal court judges Chief Justice Sujit Burman and Justice Lakshmi Kant Mahapatara reduced Singh's death sentence, and ordered the release of seven others for lack of evidence.
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The judges reconfirmed the life sentence of another man, Mahendra Hembram, and rulings on the four others were pending.
Prosecution attorney S.K. Padhi said his office was deciding whether to appeal against the decisions in the Supreme Court.
The murder of Staines and his sons was one of the worst hate crimes against Christians in recent years in India, where more than 80 per cent of the 1 billion-plus population are Hindus and 2 per cent are Christians.
The victim's brother, John Staines, of Beaudesert, south of Brisbane, said today: "I don't want to see the man put to death. He has one judge and that is God and God is righteous.
"If Dara Singh doesn't repent of what he did, he will face the judgment of God."
Mr Staines said he believed the seven others who were released today would also face God's judgment.
"I don't think they are guiltless but God knows and they will have to face the judgment that God gives and it is sure, there is no doubt about that."
Mr Staines said he had not yet spoken to his brother's Townsville-based widow but she has previously said she has forgiven the killers.
India has awarded Mrs Staines the Padma Shri, one of its top civilian honours.