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by Kumar Wethasinghe and Indeewara Thilakarathne

Colombo High Court Judge Sri Skandarajah yesterday ordered the acquittal of all 18 army personnel who were accused in the Mailenthenna massacre following a unanimous jury verdict of not guilty.

In this case 18 soldiers were indicted on 83 counts including unlawful assembly, murder of 35 people and attempted murder of six others at Mailenthenna village, Punani on August 9, 1992. Three further accused are presumed dead.

The accused were tried in the High Court of Colombo and the trial was conducted before a seven-member jury. The trial which commenced on August 25 this year came to an end yesterday at noon when the trial judge concluded his four-day summing up to the jury.

Thereafter the jury retired at 1.30 p.m. and brought in its verdict after five hours. According to their unanimous verdict the jury had found all 18 accused not guilty of the 83 charges framed against them.

Thereafter the trial judge, acting under Section 235 of the Criminal Procedure Code directed the jury to reconsider their verdict of not guilty. The Judge said he did not wish to approve the verdict straight away in view of the strong evidence that has been placed before Court against the accused separately by several witnesses.

He reminded that the Jury is bound to consider the totality of evidence, various collaborations, contradictions, omissions and medical evidence before they arrive at a final conclusion. He also cited the evidence given by S. Indrakala of Vavuniya and the medical evidence relating to injuries on the bodies of different victims and to consider the ingredients for murder and attempted murder revealed during the evidence in addition to the identifications made on the accused and to arrive at a decision after careful analysis of the entire evidence.

"You should not simply reject the evidence without reason and also must consider the evidence pertaining to each individual victim and separate charges made against each of the accused," the Judge said.

However the jury which retired at 7.25 p.m returned after one hour carrying the same unanimous verdict once more. Accordingly at 7.45 p.m, the trial judge ordered the acquittal of all 18 accused.

The acquitted are P. Kiribanda, N.W. Weerasinghe, Ratnaweerabanda, P. Sunil Dissanayaka, D.S.H. Ratnayaka, Karunanada Ranweera, B. Ranjith and H.J. Herath (both deceased), H.M.M. Lal Samarawickrama, W.M. Roland Janappriya, R.A. Nimal Karunaratne, Hurumitige Lakshman, H. Priyantha Jayawardana, Senadira Pathiranlage Nimal Edward, N. Chaminda Ratnakumara, A.M. Abeyakoon Banda, E. Wilbert Galagedara, H. Amerasinghe and W.Ajith Weragoda.

Senior State Counsel V.K. Malalagoda and State Counsel P. Kumararatne appeared for the prosecution while K.S. Ratnaweli, K. Shanmugalingam, Ramani Thotagama appeared for the aggrieved party. The Counsel for defence included Nuwan Dissanayaka, Lakshitha Jayawardana and Sanjeewa Edirisinghe.

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