The hostility of the witnesses was the biggest challenge the prosecution faced during the trial.
After a 28-year long wait, the verdict was handed down on Tuesday on the mysterious death of Sister Abhaya, a teenage nun in Kerala. An IWC court in Thiruvananthapuram convicted the defendants, Father Thomas Kottoor and Sister Sephy, on charges of murdering the nun in 1992. The amount of punishment will be decided on Thursday.
The two religious figures have been convicted despite the fact that several crucial witnesses in the case have turned hostile. In fact, hostility from witnesses was the biggest challenge the prosecution faced during the trial, which began only in August 2019.
It was in 1992 that Abhaya, a 19-year-old nun, was found dead in the well of the Pious Xth Convent in the Kottayam district of Kerala. According to the findings of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) team, Sister Abhaya was killed by two priests, Thomas Kottoor and Jose Poothrikkayil, and another nun at her convent, Sephy. However, José Poothrikkayil was later removed from the list of defendants.
According to CBI’s findings, Sister Abhaya found the priests and Sephy in a compromising position in the convent kitchen and killed her for fear that she would speak out about it. The CBI took over the case in 1993 after the Kerala Crimes Section closed it, alleging that Ms. Abhaya committed suicide.
READ: What is Sister Abhaya’s case and why did it take 28 years for a verdict?
Fifteen years after the IWC took over the case, the priests and the nun were arrested in 2008. When the trial began in August 2019, eight witnesses turned hostile.
The strongest evidence investigators had was witness statements about the disaster they saw in the kitchen after Abhaya’s body was found in the well. Abhaya’s slippers, an open refrigerator door, a bottle of water, her veil, and some other lost items indicated a struggle in the kitchen, when the victim went to drink water in the early morning of March 27, 1992.
“All the inmates of the convent had noticed this commotion in the kitchen. If Abhaya committed suicide, his chappals should be near the well. They all saw his chappals in the kitchen, but none of them testified that in court,” said prosecutor M Navas. said.
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