'Co-accused words implicating other not admissible'

New Delhi, Dec 31: The Supreme Court has held that statements madeby the co-accused in his suicide note implicating anotherco-conspirator was not admissible as evidence.

A bench comprising Justices S B Sinha and Markanadey Katju handeddown the ruling while reducing the death sentence of one Anil aliasRaju Namdev Patil to life imprisonment. He was convicted for kidnappinga five-year-old child of his employer for ransom.

Paras, a student of the Coast Guard School, was kidnapped onAugust 3, 2000 and later a ransom of Rs 25 lakh was demanded from hisparents who owned a factory in Daman.

Anil was the driver of Ashwin, father of the deceased child whosebones were recovered after five days of his kidnapping on August 7 froma 'nallah'.

Later, two killers of the child Satish and Chottu committedsuicide in a hotel. The suicide note left behind by them implicated thename of appellant Anil in the murder of the child.

The judicial Magistrate recorded the confession of the appellantunder Section 164 of the CrPC that he kidnapped the child but had nohand in the murder as he had handed over Paras to the two co-accused.

Anil was awarded capital punishment by the trial courtunderSection 364-A read with Section 201 of the IPC and the judgment wasupheld by the High Court.

However, the Supreme Court while commuting the death sentence intheir judgment on December 24 noted that the offence was punishableunder Section 364 of the IPC and not under Section 364-A as there wasno evidence that the kidnapping took place to compel government or anyforeign state or international inter-governmental organisations or anyother person to do or abstain from doing any act or to pay ransom.

The apex court also ruled, ''The statement of a deceased may beadmissible in evidence in terms of the Section 32(I) of the IndianEvidence Act to prove the cause of death or as to any of ircumstancesabout the transaction which resulted in his death.

However, when a suicide is committed by the co-accused, statementsmade in the suicide note implicating other co-accused would not beadmissible thereunder.''

UNI