The Hindu : Kerala News : Death penalty upheld

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Friday, Apr 15, 2005

Kerala

Kerala

Death penalty upheld

Legal Correspondent

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court has upheld the death penalty imposed on a `kingpin' who killed three persons in a brutal manner to show his supremacy in the village.

The accused, Holiram Bordoloi killed three persons — a man and his six-year-old son by throwing them into fire and the man's elder brother by cutting him into pieces in broad daylight before hundreds of bystanders.

Describing this as cold-blooded murder, a Bench of Justice K.G. Balakrishnan and Justice B.N. Srikrishna, held that it did not find any mitigating circumstance to refrain from imposing the death penalty on him.

Justice Balakrishnan, writing the judgment for the Bench, said the aggravating circumstances in this case were that the accused was leading the gang; the victims did not provoke or contribute to the incident; two victims were burnt to death by locking the house from outside; one of the victims, was a six year-old boy, who, somehow, managed to come out of the burning house, but he was mercilessly thrown back to the fire by the appellant-accused.

The Bench noted that the murder of one of the victims was so cold-blooded that he was dragged out of his house and cut into pieces in broad daylight in the presence of bystanders.

The entire incident was pre-planned and barbaric to deter others from challenging the supremacy of the appellant.

On the appellant's plea for showing mercy and reduce the capital punishment into one of life imprisonment, the Bench said: "There was no spark of kindness or compassion and his mind was brutal and the entire incident would have certainly shocked the collective conscience of the community."

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