Shaji to appear in court today

Puzhal prison authorities have been directed to produce Shaji Purushothaman, the main suspect in the >Mercedes accident case , in court on June 17.

The XIV metropolitan magistrate L. Abraham Lincoln issued this directive to the superintendent of the central prison in response to a petition filed by the traffic wing of the city police seeking custodial interrogation of Shaji.

A day after Shaji’s arrest, the city police sought his custody for five days to find out who had helped him evade arrest in the days following the accident

In the petition filed at the Magistrate Court in Egmore, an assistant commissioner of police said Shaji was remanded to judicial custody on Thursday night after being brought from Kochi. The initial interrogation period of 24 hours was not available to the police. Questioning Shaji would be useful in unearthing material evidence in the case, the petition stated.

Meanwhile, the court, following an application filed by Shaji, has directed the prison authorities to give him a first-class facility in the prison.