Custodial death: two police officers guilty

Incident took place in 2005; sentence to be pronounced on Friday

Civil police officers Jayakumar and Venugopal coming out of the Kollam Additional Sessions Court on Thursday.

Two civil police officers have been found guilty by K.S. Saratchandran, judge of the Kollam Additional Sessions Court-6, in a custodial death case at the Kollam East police station in the afternoon on April 6, 2005. The judge will pronounce the sentence for the two on Friday.

The officers found guilty are Jayakumar, 47, and Venugopal, 48. Public Prosecutor for the case Kottiyan N. Ajith Kumar said they were then attached to the crime squad of the police station.

Mr. Ajith Kumar said that the case pertained to the death of Rajendran, a native of Kottarakara.

On the day of the incident, a team from the police station took Rajendran into custody from a private hospital here on the charge of a mobile phone theft.

Rajendran was earlier detained by the hospital staff and handed over to the police. He was taken to the museum building in the police station complex for interrogation.

The prosecution charge was that Rajendran was subjected to third-degree torture there, as a result of which he suffered internal injuries. The police officers rushed him to the District Hospital where he was declared dead on arrival.

Out of the 60 witnesses, 37 were examined during trial and 34 of them were police officers.