The Ernakulam Rural police will initiate legal action against the media houses that have published the statements of witnesses in the actor abduction case.
The police have lodged a case against a language eveninger that published verbatim a few of the witness statements submitted by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) along with the chargesheet in the case. The action follows a report from Circle Inspector Baiju Poulose, head of the SIT, citing that the court had already issued a directive to hold the proceedings in the case in camera and the leaking of witness statements through the media made them vulnerable to being threatened by the accused.
“A case has been registered against the midday newspaper under Section 228 (A) (1) & (3) of the Indian Penal Code, which stipulates action against printing or publishing of any matter in relation to any proceedings before a court without permission. A probe is on to identify all the media houses that published such finer details of the case so as to book them for the same offence,” said a senior officer with the Ernakulam Rural police.
Chargesheet leakage
The development comes even as the Judicial First Class Magistrate Court in Angamaly is slated to pronounce its verdict on the leakage of the chargesheet in the actor abduction case on January 9.
Actor Dileep, a key accused in the case, had moved the court citing that the leakage of contents in the chargesheet at this stage would affect the verdict in the case and seeking an explanation from the Special Investigation Team (SIT) to this effect. Backing the petition, the actor also submitted a pen drive containing the visuals aired by various news channels on the leakage.
During the hearing, the prosecution, however, denied any role in the document being discussed within the public domain and sought to put the blame on the petitioner himself.
Meanwhile, sources hinted that the prosecution was likely to approach the High Court against the leakage of crucial details in the case in violation to a Supreme Court directive.
