A court has rejected a former police officer's request to appeal convictions for sexually abusing a 14-year-old girl.
Mario Didulica, 51, was jailed for a minimum of 16 months in June after being found guilty by a Victorian jury of twice sexually abusing a child under 16.
Didulica was working as a police officer when he met the girl in 2009 and began texting her after helping with a security issue at her work.
Their relationship developed from there with more than 30,000 texts sent between the two and Didulica had sex with the underage girl twice.
Despite the offending being reported to police in 2010, Didulica was not arrested until he was living in Europe eight years later, after he had left the force.
He was arrested in October 2018 while crossing the border between Croatia and Bosnia and spent 99 days in a Bosnian jail where he experienced persistent violence after inmates became aware he was an ex-cop charged with child sexual offences.
Didulica in November sought permission from the Court of Appeals to contest the two convictions.
His lawyers argued his overseas extradition to face trial contravened the law because the request was not related to any charges laid against him.
They also contended the dates provided by prosecutors of when the acts occurred were factually inconsistent, so a jury could not be able to make their decision beyond reasonable doubt.
But the court panel, made up of Judges Phillip Priest, Lesley Taylor and Robert Osborn, rejected both grounds and quashed his request to submit an appeal.
Didulica's lawyer argued the Extradition Act "prohibited the accused from being tried for an offence other than an offence for which he was surrendered", claiming the charges of oral sex on the girl were not part of his extradition request.
The appeal judges rejected this submission, pointing to the original 20 charges laid against him where charge 19 directly referenced the charge, and a police detective's affidavit describing the act in support of the extradition.
On a separate ground, Didulica's lawyers pointed to factual inconsistencies with the timeline of when two of the acts occurred.
The judges dismissed this second argument and said the jury's verdicts on the relevant charges were "logically reconcilable".
Didulica was extradited to Victoria and granted bail in January 2019 but his court case faced further delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
At one point during the period of abuse, he handed the girl a passport application, saying they could move to France where it was legal for them to be together. He promised to take care of her, and proposed to her over text.
Didulica will be registered as a sex offender for life.
1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732)
National Sexual Abuse and Redress Support Service 1800 211 028
