New Delhi, The Supreme Court has directed the release of a 70-year-old man by suspending his sentence as it termed the nearly half century long litigation in a double-murder case from Jharkhand a “failure of judicial system.”
Especially noting his medical condition and the affidavit of the State that the petitioner is admitted in the hospital, though in custody, we suspend the sentence and direct that the petitioner shall be released forthwith on condition of his not committing any crime when on bail and on his personal surety. The court noted that Simon Soren has altogether spent only two years, four months and 12 days in custody and hence the crime has gone unpunished. The bench said, “Despite the horrendous crime of a double murder, we cannot close our eyes to the ordeal suffered by the accused in the last 45 years.
A bench of Justices JB Pardiwala and K Vinod Chandran also questioned the period of over two decades taken by the Jharkhand High Court for deciding the appeal filed by accused Simon Soren, who is undergoing treatment at hospital while in custody. The bench also requisitioned the original record of the case in physical as well as digital form with a request to the high court and the trial court to send it within four weeks.
“The above case projects the failure of the judicial system, when a crime went unpunished and the accused were put to the torture of a prolonged trial of 22 years and then after conviction, the appeal filed having been dismissed after yet another two decades and two years,” the bench said in its August 19 order. “The sole remaining accused, aged about 70 and troubled with multiple ailments, has surrendered into custody after the high court convicted him ,” it said.
The court noted that out of the six, two accused died before the framing of the charges and three of the four convicted, died while the appeal was pending before the high court.
