When CCTV visuals are unclear, suspects cannot be forced to re-enact the crime for gait analysis, rules Madras High Court
The Court ruled that forcing suspects to re-enact a crime on camera would amount to self incrimination, and therefore, offend Article 20(3) of the Constitution
When the visuals of a crime captured on a closed circuit television (CCTV) camera are not clear, the police cannot force the suspects to re-enact the incident, capture it once again on the same CCTV camera and then conduct gait analysis to implicate them in the offence, the Madras High Court has ruled.
Justices M.S. Ramesh and Sunder Mohan held that forcing suspects to re-enact the occurrence, especially after making them watch the original CCTV footage, would offend Article 20(3) of the Constitution which states that no person accused of any offence should be compelled to be a witness against himself.
“Re-enacting of the occurrence would amount to giving a confession to the police or a confession while in police custody. Therefore, it has no evidentiary value and it cannot be used for comparison with the video containing the recording of the actual occurrence, if any,” the Division Bench wrote.
The Bench said, the police would be entitled to obtain voice samples, specimen handwriting and even ask the suspects to stand or walk for the purpose of comparison but they could not force the suspects to re-enact the entire incident for the purpose of gait analysis since it would amount to self incrimination.
The verdict was delivered while setting aside the death sentences imposed on seven individuals and life sentences imposed on two others in the murder case of neurosurgeon S.D. Subbiah who was hacked outside Billroth Hospitals at Raja Annamalaipuram in Chennai on September 14, 2013.
Expressing dismay over the shabby investigation conducted by the Greater Chennai City Police despite it being a sensational murder that shook the entire city, the judges said: “We are constrained to say that the investigating officers, involved in this case, have not collected evidence but created evidence to suit their case.”
According to the prosecution, the motive for the crime was a property dispute between the neurosurgeon and the family members of the first suspect P. Ponnusamy. Therefore, the latter, his wife Mary Pushpam, sons P. Basil and P. Boris and their three friends, who included a lawyer and a doctor, were implicated in the case.
The charge against the first seven suspects was that they had conspired to engage contract killers (last three suspects) to do away with the neurosurgeon. However, the testimony of the witnesses, who had reportedly overheard the conspiracy talks, was highly suspicious and unbelievable, the judges said.
“The prosecution case that the accused conspired to commit the offence of murder in the presence of a stranger, who could hear even the minute details of the conversation, is a desperate attempt to introduce witness to suit their case. The version that the accused conspired in such a manner that a stranger could hear the conversation is opposed to common sense and logic,” the Bench observed.
It also recorded the charge of the defence counsel that the investigation in the case was hastened up in January 2015 when the then Deputy Commissioner of Police K. Balakrishnan married one of the daughters of the deceased neurosurgeon and a charge-sheet was filed hurriedly on May 6, 2015.
Further, P. Iyappan, arrayed as the tenth accused in the charge-sheet, had suddenly decided to turn approver after the regular sessions judge, dealing with the murder case, was transferred and another sessions judge M.S. Sameena was made in-charge for a short period of time in October 2018. The in-charge judge granted a pardon to the accused person on October 12, 2018 and made him a prosecution witness.
Thereafter, on October 30, 2018 she wrote to the High Court stating that she had appeared for Mr. Balakrishnan in a Family court proceeding during her stint as a lawyer and was therefore, not interested in hearing the murder case.
“From the above facts, we are convinced that the proceedings of the learned sessions judge give rise to a reasonable apprehension of real likelihood of bias,” the Division Bench said and refused to accept the testimony of the approver to confirm the conviction and sentences imposed by the trial court against the other accused persons.
Further, dissecting all other materials relied upon by the prosecution to prove the money trail and so on, the Bench delivered a 282-page verdict explaining how none of those materials were worthy of being accepted by the criminal court for the purpose of convicting and sentencing the accused persons.
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