COIMBATORE: In violation of Supreme Court guidelines which state that people should not be arrested from court premises, Salem City police arrested a history-sheeter on Salem court campus on Thursday. Assistant Commissioner of Police (Salem North) Aswini said John, the history-sheeter, faced threat to his life from a rival gang and police had to take him into custody to save his life.
According to sources, John of Kitchipalayam was wanted in several cases, including two murders. He recently got conditional bail in one of the murder cases and was released from prison four days ago. He was ordered by the court to appear in the Annathanappatti police station and sign the register for 60 days as part of the bail condition, but he failed to comply with it, sources said.
On Thursday, he visited the Combined Court Complex at Hasthampatti to appear for a court hearing in a murder case registered against him in 2017. He came out of the court hall after the hearing and was about to get into a car when a team of police personnel surrounded him and took him into its custody.
He was forcibly taken into a police vehicle waiting outside the court and taken to a police station in Salem South limits. Sources said John was booked in a robbery case a few days ago by Kitchipalayam police. They suspect either Annathanappatti police or Kitchipalayam police may have taken over his custody.
DCP S Brinda (Salem North) in whose jurisdiction the incident happened said she was not aware of the incident and assured that she would look into it. Salem City Police Commissioner Praveen Kumar Abhinapu did not respond to calls from TNIE.