How Ilze helped secure justice for her sister who was raped and killed in Kerala

From regularly posting videos online, to sticking flyers and following court proceedings for years, Ilze had to fight a long battle for justice.
How Ilze helped secure justice for her sister who was raped and killed in Kerala
How Ilze helped secure justice for her sister who was raped and killed in Kerala
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Shortly after the verdict came on a four and half-year-old case of the rape and murder of a Latvian woman in Kerala, the victim’s sister appeared on a video, expressing her happiness and gratitude in a few quick words. Ilze with her glasses and a light smile on her face looked a world apart from the teary-eyed woman who posted video after video in the immediate days after her sister went missing in Kovalam in early 2018. It has been a terribly long battle for Ilze Skromane, but in the end, she is happy with the judgement, she said -- as Umesh and Udayan, the two men who raped and murdered her sister in a mangrove near Kovalam were convicted for the crime.

Ilze and her elder sister had come not merely as tourists to Kovalam, where hundreds of tourists come every season, drawn by the beauty of the beach and the abundance of green that Kerala is known for. The deceased was also suffering from mental health issues and had sought Ayurvedic treatment at a centre in Pothencode. Ilze had accompanied her. The sisters came down to Kerala from Ireland where they lived, on February 2, 2018. A month and a half later, on March 14, Ilze could not find her sister anywhere.

Long, daunting search for her sister

Frantically, she went to the police, asked the people in the neighbourhood, and sought everyone’s help. But her sister remained unfound for far too many days. Ilze began posting videos online, asking for help to find her sister, showing flyers that announced rewards of Rs 100,000 and phone numbers to call.

“My sister has been missing for 8 days!! Please help us to activate the search by sharing and getting more people involved! (sic),” Ilze wrote on March 22, 2018. In a video where she is trying hard to suppress her sobs, Ilze said that it was very tough, and they had to mount pressure on the police by going to the ministers and the media so that a proper search would be conducted.

Ilze still had hope in those early days, even weeks after she could not locate her sister. At the end of two weeks, a calmer-looking Ilze came on a video and said that the police have been looking intensely for the last few days but there were no leads yet and that people have spoken about seeing her sister but there was nothing concrete to go on with. People in the locality were helping in the search and she hoped that her sister would be found soon, Ilze said.

Yet another week passed by with no news of the missing sister. Ilze posted a proper video, showing her walking around the neighbourhood and posting flyers with her sister’s photo, asking for information and promising rewards. The reward money had gone up to Rs 200,000 by then. Height 170, Hair brown and Eyes blue, said the flyer. The video introduces the sister as a charming and vibrant personality who truly believed that ‘her true wealth is the good she does in this world’.

“I keep wondering how she could disappear so suddenly and the only logical conclusion I can come to is that she must have trusted somebody and got in a car and that they took her somewhere. I have no idea of their intentions or whether she is safe or if she is taken care of. I just really want to tell them that we have no intention of judging somebody or pressing charges; all we want is to have her back safe and bring her home,” Ilze said in the video, looking visibly upset.

Recovery of the corpse, battle for justice

On April 20, the sister was found murdered in a forest in Thiruvallom, about eight kilometers away from Kovalam. Her body had decomposed and her head was separated from the body. She was sexually assaulted and murdered. From here began the arduous battle for justice.

Ilze was always vocal about her disappointment at the half-baked investigation of the police into the missing case. In media interviews in those initial days, she said she suspected foul play since the police had suggested all too soon that the sister might have died by suicide. While she admitted that her sister, clinically depressed, had made suicide attempts before, she had been getting better.

Making up for all the lost time – the time that the victim’s family believed might have saved her – the police rounded up a few suspects within days and arrested two of them – Udayan and Umesh, both then in their 20s. But they were released on bail soon after, reportedly owing to the police’s delay in filing the charge sheet.

For Ilze, the discovery of her sister’s death was in one way, a closure. In an earlier interview with TNM, she said that it would have been worse if they had not found her sister, not knowing what happened to her, and wondering about it for the rest of their lives. She did not see it as going back home without her sister. You can take away a body, but not a person, Ilze said.

On May 6, 2018, Ilze participated in a commemoration event for her sister in Thiruvananthapuram, put together by the tourism department. She, with her sister’s partner Andrew Jordan, planted a tree in the Kanakakunnu Palace grounds. She spoke of her sister as someone who trusted the goodness in people so much that she believed the worst criminals could still turn to goodness in life. “She saw people as one and the same,” Ilze said, wearing a Sari and a bindi for the occasion.

She flew back to Ireland, choosing to cremate her sister in Kerala and take the ashes home. But she kept returning to follow the trial. When after more than three years, it was still not over, she moved the High Court for a speedy trial. The trial finally began in June this year and the court allowed her to watch the proceedings online. She told the Times of India that she was writing a book about her sister and waiting for the verdict in the case to complete it.

Letting her emotions stay on her face, Ilze once again came on video on December 2, saying how happy she was with the verdict and what a great day it was for everyone who loved her sister and supported the family. After thanking everyone who stood with her, Ilze expressed as she always does, clearly and genuinely, how she hoped that all of this would encourage other people also to stand up for what is right. She hoped, she said, that women and men alike can go out on the streets safely and that people can come to Kerala and enjoy its beauty, feeling safe and protected, and knowing that they will be taken care of. That is her wish for everyone, Ilze said.

Video: Latvian woman who fought for her sister killed in Kerala finally gets justice

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