A CBI special court here on Wednesday sentenced to death by hanging two police officers for torturing to death Udayakumar, 26, at the Fort police station in 2005.
The CBI Special Judge Nazar handed down the capital punishment to K. Jithukumar and S.V. Sreekumar, both serving senior civil police officers.
Udayakumar’s 67-year-old mother, Prabhavathi Amma, was in court when the judge passed the sentence on the accused. The accused officers wept when they realised the gravity of the order.
The judge said he found no mitigating circumstances to reduce the quantum of punishment. Law enforcers are protectors of life and property and not death dealers. The accused had killed an innocent person in their custody. They deserve no clemency, he said. Justice Nazar ruled the crime fell in the rarest of the rare category that deserved death.
The illegal actions of the accused had severely eroded public trust in the law enforcement and caused social harm.
The court also sentenced two retired SPs, K. Haridas and E. K. Sabu, and one serving Dy.SP, Ajith Kumar, for having attempted to cover up the crime by registering a false case of theft against Udayakumar, suppressing evidence and falsifying station records.
Udayakumar’s death had ignited public outrage after a preliminary probe revealed that he was innocent of the crime of theft the police had tried to foist on him using the third degree.
The accused had apprehended Udayakumar from a nearby public park along with one Suresh Kumar, a history-sheeter, on September 27, 2005.
The CBI proved that the officers had subsequently strapped Udayakumar to a wooden bench at the station and inflicted fatal crush injuries on his thighs to force a confession that the ₹4,200 found on his person were proceeds from the sale of loot. It later turned out that the money was Onam bonus paid by his employer, a scrapyard owner.
Notably, six officers who were at the station during the crime testified against their colleagues by turning approvers in the case. The CBI also relied on crime scene records and forensic reports. One of the accused, K.V. Soman, had died during the trial.