The Kerala High Court on Friday, September 17, dismissed an anticipatory bail application filed by Sessy Xavier, who had managed to dupe the legal system and practice as an advocate for two years, with neither an LLB degree nor being enrolled in the state bar council. By denying the bail, Justice Shircy V asked the accused to surrender and cooperate with the ongoing police investigation, LiveLaw reported.
Before she was caught, Sessy had appeared in court on many occasions as a lawyer. She had even contested the Bar Association Election and was elected as the librarian. Sessy had reportedly been able to dupe the bar council by working as a junior advocate in a well-established lawyer’s office in Alappuzha. Before that, she had even done her internship under the same lawyer, claiming that she was a law student. She then claimed to have enrolled with the bar council, and in 2019, applied to get into the Alappuzha Bar Association.
However, in July, representatives of the Bar Association received an anonymous letter stating Sessy did not have the required degrees to practice law. Later, the association alerted the Chief Judge of the district and filed a police complaint with the Alappuzha North police station. Sessy had also created a fake bar council enrollment number, which belonged to another advocate in Thiruvananthapuram, a Bar Association official had earlier told TNM. The Thiruvananthapuram Bar Association also filed a complaint with the police, stating that the Alappuzha council was misusing one of their enrollment numbers. The Alappuzha Bar Association also filed a police complaint, which further alleged that Sessy had misused her position as Bar Librarian by taking certain books and documents from the library.
Sessy was charged under sections 417 (punishment for cheating) and 419 (punishment for cheating by impersonation) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), which are bailable offences. She was then charged under section 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property) of the IPC, which is non-bailable. She had earlier attempted to surrender before the court, but reportedly fled the courtroom upon learning that she was booked under non-bailable charges. She was absconding after the incident, but had approached the court seeking anticipatory bail on July 29.