The Madras High Court Bench here has ordered for a retrial in a double murder case wherein the trial court convicted and sentenced one person to life imprisonment.
Justice S Nagamuthu and Justice V S Ravi said the police "failed to prove the charge beyond reasonable doubt" and observed "retrial is ordered to ensure that mistakes by the committed by the prosecution do not lead to failure of justice".
The judges were disposing the appeal filed by the mason who was accused of murdering two women workers at Thuvakudi in tiruchi district in 2006.
The appeallant aruged that retrial would only help the prosecution to fill the lacunae in the case. But the judges said the retrial was being ordered in the interest of justice.
The judges expressed anguish by the way the trial court conducted the case and said that in future such "short comings, errors and mistakes in investigation as well as trial leading to failure of justice would not be repeated."
The judges said the police prosecuted the mason for murdering one woman and closing the other case without conducting any investigation. The court had an obligation to see that justice was done to the parties and it could not close its eyes when there was miscarriage of justice.
The court directed Tiruchi Superintendent of police to appoint a competent officer to investigate the murder of the other woman too whose decomposed body was also exhumed from Valavanthankottai Udayar Mayanam.
