Police will begin evidence collection with the three accused from Tuesday – AI image
Kottayam : In a rare order, the juvenile justice board has permitted the “escorted movement” of three juvenile accused apprehended in connection with the murder of an elderly man at Karuvatta in Alappuzha and the alleged theft of the victim’s ornaments. Assistant public prosecutor Manu Kallampally said the Juvenile Justice Act contains no provision for placing minors in police custody. Police will begin evidence collection with the three accused from Tuesday. The prosecution had argued that while the JJ Act strictly bars keeping children in police lock-up or jail, it is silent on custody for investigation purposes — and that in such cases, provisions under the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS) should apply.
The board accepted this argument, officials said, in what the investigation team described as a significant order with no known precedent. The prosecution contended that since the alleged murder took place at night inside a locked house with no eyewitnesses and only minors as accused, the case would be considerably weakened without their assistance in evidence collection.