Sampath case: plea to hand over files

Kochi: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Tuesday filed a petition in the High Court seeking a directive to the police to hand over the case diary files relating to the custodial death of Sampath, an accused in a murder case in Palakkad.

Probe delayed

In its petition, investigation officer S. Unnikrishnan said if these files were not handed over it would cause inordinate delay in taking up the investigation.

He said the files were yet to be given to the CBI though a Division Bench dismissed an appeal filed by the State government against the single judges directive for a CBI probe on June 11. The investigation could be started only if the CBI received those files. It was highly necessary that a directive be issued to the police to hand over the files.

The court while ordering a CBI probe had observed that the investigation in this case by the State police had turned out to be a mockery with only perfunctory attempts to weave a seemingly plausible story of a torture while in police custody.

The judge had said that much strain was not necessary to infer that there was an orchestrated attempt to shield certain officers in the higher echelons of the police and make certain officers of relatively lower rank scapegoats