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28-yr-old drug case returns to haunt Kerala minister
The case had unfolded with the arrest of Australian citizen, Andrew Salvatore Cervelli, in Thiruvananthapuram airport on April 9, 1990 on charges of carrying 61.5 gm of hashish. He reportedly concealed the contraband in a small pocket in his underwear. The inner was produced as the key evidence when he was produced in a court. A junior lawyer then, Raju, was one of his counsels.
A three-decade-old case has returned to haunt Kerala transport minister Antony Raju as a Thiruvananthapuram court is scheduled to hear allegations of tampering key evidence in a 1990 drug haul case next month.
The case had unfolded with the arrest of Australian citizen, Andrew Salvatore Cervelli, in Thiruvananthapuram airport on April 9, 1990 on charges of carrying 61.5 gm of hashish. He reportedly concealed the contraband in a small pocket in his underwear. The inner was produced as the key evidence when he was produced in a court. A junior lawyer then, Raju, was one of his counsels.
After two years’ trial, the district court in Thiruvananthapuram sentenced him to 10 years rigorous imprisonment. In 1993, the Kerala high court had acquitted him his counsel argued that the underwear in court custody, the main evidence, was too small as the accused was stout and fat. After his acquittal, Cervelli left the country immediately.
The investigating officer KK Jayamohan filed a complaint saying he feared that evidence was tampered. However, his complaint in court failed to move ahead.
The case took a turn in 1996 when Cervelli was arrested in connection with a murder in Australia. During interrogation, he told Australian investigators that how his family bribed a court clerk and others in India to tamper with evidence, and he got out of a drug case. Later, this crucial information was passed on to the Central Bureau of Investigation through Interpol.
Though the case was re-opened in 2002 at the initiative of the HC it failed to make any headway, and later it was dumped in unsolved cases slot. In 2005, when TP Senkumar took over as the IG southern range, he started re-investigation into it, official records showed.
During investigation, the court clerk (Jose K ) admitted to police that he had given the underwear to one of the lawyers of Cervelli in August 1990 and a smaller one was returned to him in December. He got some money for replacing the evidence. There were also entries in the police register supporting his statement.
Later, the probe team found that the lawyer in question was Raju, then a junior advocate in the district court. A youth leader of the Kerala Congress leader Raju later left his lawyer profession to take a deep plunge into politics.
Later, forensic officials found that the underwear was cut and re-stitched to make it smaller. The district court later ordered police to register a cheating case against the court clerk and Raju. The case dragged on due to technical reasons. In 2013, a charge sheet was filed against Raju and the court clerk. Court records show the case was deferred 22 times, and later it was shifted to another court in Nedumangad in the same district.
The minister, however, said his lawyer used to appear on his behalf and he took bail from the court many years ago. “I did not hide anything. I mentioned about this case in my election affidavit also. Court delay is not due to me and my lawyer used to appear for me every time,” he said. But people close to him said the old case was raked up by trade unions in the state road transport corporation, who are waging a battle against him. Unions have opposed the minister as he tried to cue expenses of ailing transport corporation.
Since Raju was earlier in the Congress camp, opposition is also not keen to make it a big issue but many young Congress leaders have voiced their concern. “It is another blot on the present regime,” said former legislator VT Balaram in his Facebook post.
Many legal experts said it was a classical case of judicial delay and travesty of justice. “It is sad even in critical drug case inordinate delay is taking place. If such a situation continued people will lose faith in the system,” said senior lawyer and political observer A Jayashankar.
