Panadura police station incident:

Cash, surety bail on nine suspects

Kapila SOMARATNE-Panadura group correspondent

Panadura Magistrate Ranga Dissanayake ordered cash bail in Rs 5,000 and surety bail in Rs 500,000 on each of the nine suspects produced before court from remand custody in connection with the Panadura Police incident where they had allegedly entered the Panadura Police station under the influence of liquor and attempted to get the release of two suspects in custody. The suspects were in connection with committing a traffic offence on December 26.

Panadura Acting Magistrate G D Perera had released on bail another four suspects involved in the same incident on December 31. When the case was called on January 3. No Senior Police officers were present in Court to submit the report of investigations to Court. Sergeant Karunaratne and Sergeant Edirisinghe of the Panadura Police were present and defended Police.

Edirisinghe told the Magistrate that on December 26, several youth entered the Police station under the influence of liquor and threatened the policeman on duty. They attempted to release two suspects arrested regarding a traffic accident where two were injured. When the two suspects were produced before a medical officer of the Panadura Hospital, 13 youth followed the Policemen and created a scene at the Panadura Hospital too.

They had threatened the Medical officer and used a pen to stab the Medical Officer. Another youth dashed a torch light of the Medical Officer and later came to the Police station and demanded the release of the two suspects in Police custody. The Policeman summoned policemen at the barracks and arrested the 13 suspects who created a scene inside the Police station. There were five witnesses, Edirisinghe said.

Attorney at Law Vagira Kavisinghe with Sugath Hadunge appearing for the suspects submitted that this was a fabricated case. The Police had not submitted a full investigation report to the Court regarding the matter giving full details of the incident.