Journalism of Courage
‘Suspicion can’t substitute proof’: 3 acquitted in 15-year-old Bengaluru cop murder
A Bengaluru court acquitted 3 accused in the 2011 murder of a traffic constable, ruling that gaps in circumstantial evidence and inadmissible call records weakened the prosecution’s case.
The court also imposed a combined fine of Rs 90,000 on the Verma couple.
More than 15 years after a Bengaluru constable was murdered and his body burnt to hide the crime, a local court last Tuesday acquitted a woman and two men accused of the murder, ruling that the prosecution’s chain of circumstantial evidence had too many missing links to sustain a conviction.
The victim, Vijay Kumar, a traffic head constable at Malleswaram traffic police station, had gone missing on May 6, 2011. The next day, his charred body was found on a farmland near Bangarpet. The police arrested one Shobha Rani, Kumar, and Faizal on charges of murder, destroying evidence, and criminal conspiracy under the Indian Penal Code. The police claimed that the murder took place over a financial dispute related to a loan given by Vijay Kumar to Shobha Rani. They, thereafter, filed a charge sheet containing statements of 37 witnesses.
According to the prosecution, Vijay Kumar was first administered sedatives and then killed. But the toxicology reports found no trace of sleeping pills or sedatives in the deceased’s viscera, the court observed.
The prosecution had mentioned that it relied on the Call Detail Records (CDRs) linked to the victim and the accused while filing the charge sheet. However, the investigating officer produced the CDRs before the court without the mandatory certification under Section 65B of the Evidence Act.
In the judgment, Principal City Civil and Sessions Judge K S Bharath Kumar observed, “The call detail records relied upon by the prosecution are not supported by the mandatory certificate under Section 65-B of the Indian Evidence Act, and therefore their evidentiary value is seriously affected. Consequently, there is no legally admissible evidence showing any prior communication or coordination between the accused persons suggesting a meeting of minds.”
“The prosecution seeks to infer conspiracy solely from the alleged subsequent conduct and the recovery proceedings, which by themselves are insufficient to establish the offence of conspiracy. Suspicion, however strong, cannot substitute legal proof,” the judgment noted.
© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd
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