MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court recently acquitted a woman who was sentenced to life by a Sessions Court in Pudukkottai on charges of murdering her husband in 2021.
A bench of justices N Anand Venkatesh and P Dhanabal passed the order after noting that both the Pudukkottai police and the trial court failed to conduct DNA analysis to identify the body of the deceased, which was found in a well near the couple’s house. Hearing an appeal filed by the woman challenging the conviction and sentence imposed on her in 2022, the judges observed that in a case of homicidal death, the primary fact that has to be established by the prosecution is the identity of the deceased.
Only if the identity is fixed, the court can go into the other factors, they added. But in the present case, the dead body, which was found in a highly decomposed state, was identified by the mother of the deceased based on the footwear and mobile phone discovered with the body; the judges noted and criticised the investigation officer for not sending the DNA samples collected from the body for analysis.
The trial court should also share the blame equally for proceeding further on assumptions, they added. “It would be highly risky to assume that the identified corpse is that of the deceased and to base the case’s decision on this assumption,” the judges opined and set aside the trial court’s order.