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The Kerala High Court on Friday, June 12, issued an interim order directing the memory card containing visuals of the 2017 actor assault to be kept in the safe custody of the Court’s Registrar General. Calling the order a major relief for the survivor, actor and activist Prakash Bare, also a member of the Avalkoppam Trust formed to support the survivor actor, said that the intervention was significant in protecting the integrity of crucial evidence and restoring faith in the judicial process.
The order was issued by Justice CS Dias, while considering the survivor’s plea seeking a fresh probe by a Special Investigation Team (SIT) into the unauthorised access of the memory card while it was in court custody. Senior advocate Vrinda Grover, appearing for the survivor, argued that the previous inquiry into the illegal access of the memory card was riddled with lapses, including the failure to seek the assistance of forensic experts despite court directions.
The High Court directed the Ernakulam District and Sessions Judge to immediately hand over the memory card and pen drive in a sealed cover to the Registrar General, where it will remain until further orders. The prosecution has been granted a month to file its counter-affidavit.
Registrar General G Gopakumar was the former Additional Sessions Judge who acquitted ex-Jalandhar Bishop Franco Mulakkal in the nun rape case in 2022.
The memory card in the actor assault case was illegally accessed while it was in court custody — twice in 2018, when it was with the Angamaly Magistrate Court and the Ernakulam Principal and Sessions court, and once in 2021, when it was before the trial court. The State Forensic Science Laboratory found that the hash value of the memory card had changed, indicating that the device had been accessed.
On December 7, 2023, the High Court directed Sessions Judge Honey M Varghese to conduct an enquiry into the survivor’s allegation that the memory card may have been tampered with and the visuals possibly transmitted. The order, however, triggered controversy as the second and third instances of unauthorised access allegedly took place when the memory card was under the custody of courts presided over by her.
