Experience counts a lot

Ananda JAYASENA-Snr. Supt. of Police (RTD)

Forty years back, the Police Department was held in high esteem and was respected by the members of the public, unlike today, constables were not allowed to handle Court cases. There were directives that an Inspector or a Senior Sergeant should handle Court cases.

In early seventies, the Superintendent of Police Kalutara Division was L. C. Abeysekara, a Thomian athlete of repute, who was a weather- beaten cop.

In the year 1973. I was attached to Panadura Police. My IP Crimes was Inspector T. N. Rajee a clever investigator.

End of this year, on the night of November 15 a case of gang robbery was reported from Hirana, the house of Rex Clement Almeida.

This house is situated in a lonely place, owner, his wife, Annie Therese Fonseka, a young servant girl and the elderly watcher Pedirick Singho had been at home.

The mistress of the house Annie had put the servant girl into a room, closed and locked it and kept the key with her.

The gang of robbers had killed the watcher, bound the hands of the master and the mistress of the house taken the licensed gun, gold and jewellery and had fled in the owners jeep EN 276 which was in the garage.

After about one hour, Rex Almeida had got himself freed, took the servant girl from the place of hiding and found the watcher killed and house ransacked. Also he noticed his 12 bore shot gun too removed. None of them had seen any of the intruders.

Panadura Police was informed and IP Rajee OIC Crimes took up investigations. He had already given messages to the Registrar of Finger Prints, to Police Training School for Police Dogs.

Also I gave a message to Magistrate Panadura to order DMO Panadura to hold the post-mortem examination on the body of killed person and also to detail an official to hold the 'on the spot inquest' and I too left to the scene of murder. At the scene I learnt that five to six people had come to the house, around 2 a.m. on the night of November 15, 1973 killed the watcher, burgled the house, removed about Rs. 32,000 worth of gold and jewellery and also had left in the complainants jeep EN 276.

IP Rajee, had made the observation of the dead body, made his notes in detail of the observation of the scene of murder. The shot gun removed had been issued with a permit by the GA Kachcheri Colombo, to R. C. Almeida. The permit no is N 014410 in favour of gun No. 73128. Date of issue 07.01.73. Also IP Crimes had found out that their wedding ring had been amongst the stolen jewellery worth Rs. 32,145. On the inner side of the wedding ring initials RCA + ATF 20.06.57 had been engraved. ATF was for her initials Annie Therese Fonseka and 20.06.57 had been the date of marriage.

Dr. A. H. Hoole, DMO Panadura held the post-mortem examination on the body of the deceased watcher Pedirick Singho at the scene itself, and found three stab injuries on the front of the chest, of which two had pierced the heart and was necessarily fatal. On this report D.C. de Silva gave a verdict of homicide.

The jeep No. EN 276 which had been stolen had been left close to St. John's College with its radiator cap missing and the engine had got busted.

Time went by, PC 2484 Perera who is from Bandaragama and worked at Panadura had a good information system. One of his private informants had told him that this robbery had been masterminded by a person called Sapin Silva of Kolamediriya who had been in the Army earlier.

One night around 12.30 a.m. Sapin had been whisked away from home by IP Raju and a party and brought to Panadura Police Station.

IP Rajee and I started interrogating Sapin around 1 a.m. He was a hard nut to crack. Around 5 a.m. he spilt the beans and said that he will speak the truth. He in his statement stated that Karathelis, Surabiel of Alutgama, Martin and he came to Welikada as discussed earlier and met Saman Peris the son of ex headman, and all of them decided to rob the house of Rev. Almeida of Hirana. Saman Peris partakes in this type of cases only to commit rape on an inmate.

When they questions who are at home from Pedirick the watcher, he said the husband and his wife have locked themselves up. All of them started assaulting Pedirick and when he could not tell where the money and jewellery was, Sapin drew a knife from his waist and stabbed Pedirick to death. They ransacked the house, collected the jewellery, a shot gun and got into a parked jeep at home and Saman drove the Jeep with four of them. As there was no radiator cap, the jeep engine gave a noise and stopped. Engine was allowed to cool and water was poured into the engine. As the front number plate of the jeep was dangling, Saman took it off and threw it to the river and washed his hands as there was grease. The wedding ring was taken by him and he promise to hand over the same to police. The gun was taken by Karathelis and a portion of the jewellery was given to Surabiel and Martin.

IP Rajee went and recovered the wedding ring with the initials of Mr. and Mrs. Almeida. The accused was remanded to fiscal custody.

Suspect Karathelis was arrested and the stolen gun was recovered from him. IP Rajee arrested the other two accused and the stolen goods were recovered and identified by the complainant and his wife.

All four accused were remanded to fiscal custody pending completion of inquiries.

When I forwarded this crime file to my SP, he had carefully read the file and had made the following endorsements -

HQI Panadura

Get a diver to trace the number plate of the jeep from the river as there had been a coating of oil.

There is a possibility of having the finger prints of the accused. Sgd. (C. Abeysekare SPWP/s) The number plate was recovered by a diver and same was sent to RFP who identified that two prints were visible on top of the grease layer of the plate. Accused Saman was arrested and produced in Courts and moved Court to send his finger prints to compare with the prints on the number plate of the jeep.

Within 5 days, RFP reported that the two prints found on the plate of EN 276 is of suspect Saman Perera.

Inspector T. N. Rajee filed plaint against all accused for the murder of Pedirick Singho and to the robbery of a gun and housebreaking and theft of cash and jewellery worth Rs. 32,145 under G 296, CPC along with G 443/382 CPC and after a lengthy trial. The Magistrate committed this case to be heard in Supreme Court, Kalutara.

After one year this case came up for trial in Supreme Court Kalutara and when this case was taken up for trial before an English speaking jury.

The judge at the conclusion, commended the police for tracing the number plate from the river bed at Hirana. Only on this evidence accused Saman Perera got convicted.

The judge sentenced all accused to be hanged at Welikada Prisons for causing the death of Pedirick Singho, the watcher.

(Names of the accused has been changed to hide the correct identity)