Sathankulam Custodial Killing: All Nine Policemen Given Death Sentence
New Delhi: All nine policemen who were convicted of murdering 58-year-old P. Jeyaraj and his 31-year-old son Benicks in their Sathankulam, Tamil Nadu police station almost six years ago were sentenced to death on Monday (April 6) and fined over Rs 1 crore overall.
“If ordinary citizens had committed the same crime, ordinary punishment could have been given, but the police themselves have committed the crime,” the Deccan Herald quoted judge G. Muthukumaran as saying on Monday. Life imprisonment, he added, “would not instill fear in police officers”.
“Where there was power there should be responsibility. Jayaraj and Benicks were unarmed and were tortured at regular intervals all through the night at the police station,” judge Muthukumaran also said per The Hindu. The order in the case is awaited.
Apart from being sentenced to death, the nine policemen – S. Sridhar, K. Balakrishnan, P. Raghuganesh, S. Murugan, A. Samidurai, M. Muthuraja, S. Chelladurai, X. Thomas Francis and S. Veilumuthu – against whom charges including murder, wrongful confinement and filing a false case were filed, were also fined a total of Rs 1,00,40,000.
Their death sentence is to be carried out only after it is confirmed by the Madurai bench of the Madras high court.
A tenth policeman, A. Pauldurai, was also named in the case but died of COVID-19 while in jail in August 2020.
The police personnel in Sathankulam in Thoothukudi district had picked up cell phone shop owner Jeyaraj for allegedly violating lockdown protocol on June 19, 2020, and later his son Benicks too after he had come to the station looking for his father. Both were brutally tortured in custody and died of their injuries days later, on June 23 and 22 respectively.
The CBI, which took over the case shortly thereafter, said that the officers made Jeyaraj and Bennicks clean the blood from their own wounds and that the father-son duo had not violated lockdown rules to begin with.
The Wire is now on WhatsApp. Follow our channel for sharp analysis and opinions on the latest developments.
