Actor sexual assault case | HC allows prosecution plea to examine additional witnesses

Ernakulam Additional Special Sessions Judge had earlier directed the Investigation Officer to file a report by January 20 on the further investigation being conducted into the revelations of Balachandrakumar, who claims to be Dileep's friend, in the case.

January 17, 2022 12:35 pm | Updated January 18, 2022 10:00 am IST - KOCHI

Kerala High Court. File.

Kerala High Court. File.

The Kerala High Court on January 17 allowed the prosecution to examine five additional witnesses and re-examine three witnesses in the case relating to sexual assault on a woman actor, in which actor Dileep is an accused.

Justice Kauser Edappagath also directed the State government to see that a new Special Public Prosecutor is appointed or make some other alternative arrangements to conduct the cases and ensure that examination of witnesses and production of documents were done within 10 days.

The court passed the verdict on the appeals filed by the prosecution challenging the orders of the Ernakulam Additional Special Sessions Court rejecting the prosecution’s applications seeking to recall some of the witnesses and summon additional witnesses for examination in the case.

According to the prosecution’s petition, its plea for issuing summons under section 311 of the Criminal Procedure Code(CrPC) to 16 witnesses for taking further evidence was rejected by the Special court. Of the 16 witnesses, 9 witnesses were additional witnesses. In fact, some of the witnesses were required to be recalled to identify the accused persons. The orders passed by the lower court was illegal and the trial court should have permitted the prosecution to re-examination the witnesses and examine the additional witnesses, the prosecution contended.

Ernakulam Additional Special Sessions Judge had earlier directed the Investigation Officer to file a report by January 20 on the further investigation being conducted into the revelations of Balachandrakumar, who claims to be Dileep's friend, in the case.

Balachandrakumar had claimed that he had seen ‘Pulsar’ Suni, prime accused in the case, at the residence of Dileep. He said it was Dileep’s brother Anoop who introduced Suni to him in December 2016 at the actor’s residence at Aluva. He had also alleged that Dileep had got a copy of the video on the sexual assault of the woman actor even before it was produced before the court

Crime Branch raids

A team of Crime Branch personnel raided the house of actor Dileep’s friend and hotelier Sarath Nair and of his brother in law Sooraj on Monday evening.

The raid was continuing into the night.

This was in connection with the case registered against Dileep, Sooraj and three others following the statement given by film director Balachandrakumar that they spoke of endangering the life of police personnel who probed the 2017 case relating to the sexual assault on an actor in Kochi.

The Crime Branch team had raided the houses of Dileep, his brother Anoop and the office of the production house owned by the actor, on Thursday last.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.