The Madras High Court on June 14, 2024 set aside the conviction and death sentence imposed by a trial court on seven individuals and life imprisonment for two others in relation to the sensational murder of neurosurgeon S.D. Subbiah near Billroth Hospital in Raja Annamalaipuram in Chennai in 2013.
Judges M.S. Ramesh and Sunder Mohan allowed all nine of the criminal appeals resulting to acquittal of P. Ponnusamy, his wife Mary Pushpam, sons Basil and Boris who were among others namely B. William, H. Yesurajan, J. James Sathish Kumar, E. Murugan and S. Selva Prakash charged with murder cases.
If there was no other case against them then they should immediately be released from prison; and if any amount was already paid as a fine when the criminal appeal was still pending, it should be refunded to them as required by the Bench.
These appeals had been lodged against Ms.Pushpam’s life imprisonment as well as that handed down to Mr.Yesurajan among others along with capital punishment for having caused the death of their fellow doctor while he was working on a property dispute within the family according to Presiding Judge.
At about five o’clock p.m., on September 14, 2013, he was attacked by three men while about to enter his vehicle parked at one side of a road in R.A Puram situated at Chennai where he sustained multiple wounds causing his demise later on September 23, 2013 according to Prosecution.
Soon after his demise however due to FIR change from section 307 (attempted murder) towards section 302 (murder) IPC, the police detained ten suspects out of whom number ten person accused known as P.Iyappan accepted plea bargain that led him being discharged.
Later, other accused persons were charged and brought before the court based on the evidence of a witness, who had gone to R.A. Puram for collection of an old air conditioner from a house nearby, but reported the matter to police after two days.
After conducting serious investigations on this case, it was found that Mr.Ponnusamy and his family members incited the gang to murder their relative which arose due to land dispute.
