{"id":111034,"date":"2021-01-26T18:00:42","date_gmt":"2021-01-27T01:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=111034"},"modified":"2021-01-26T18:00:42","modified_gmt":"2021-01-27T01:00:42","slug":"did-abraham-sumanthiran-lure-alponso-ranjan-to-his-orumitthanadu-den-part-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/01\/26\/did-abraham-sumanthiran-lure-alponso-ranjan-to-his-orumitthanadu-den-part-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Did Abraham Sumanthiran lure Alponso Ranjan to his Orumitthanadu den? \u2013 part 3."},"content":{"rendered":"

C. Wijeyawickrema, LL.B., Ph.D.<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n
\nhttp:\/\/lankacnews.com\/%e0%b6%a5%e0%b7%8f%e0%b6%ab%e0%b7%8f%e0%b7%83%e0%b7%8f%e0%b6%bb-%e0%b7%84%e0%b7%92%e0%b6%b8%e0%b7%92-19-%e0%b7%80%e0%b7%83%e0%b6%bb%e0%b6%9a%e0%b6%a7-%e0%b7%84%e0%b7%92%e0%b6%bb%e0%b7%99%e0%b7%8a\/\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

How did the 2 court of appeal judges and the 2\nsupreme court judges who refused Ven. G\u2019s permission to appeal, miss this video\nclip? <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Six lawyers and a\nmonk: importance of impotence<\/strong>
\nPosted on January 22nd, 2019 – Lankaweb<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Part II-continuation<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is strange why the monk\u2019s lawyers did not\npresent the video clip above as evidence.  It is also strange why the two\nmonks who gave evidence on behalf of the monk said contradictory stories, which\nthe judges used against the accused monk. The evidence used by CA was what the\nthree lawyers said in the court and not the video tape recorded at the scene\nwhen it took place.  Lawyers are not supposed to coach prospective\nwitnesses to tell lies, but under an adversarial system of litigation, lawyers\nhave a duty to examine the witnesses in advance, assess their evidence, and\ndecide not to use them if their evidence is going to harm the accused instead\nof helping hm. The use of such evidence by a court to impute criminal intention\nis a case of cutting pork on a leg of pork.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Balu\nTheendu and BBS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When S B Dissanayake was sent to jail for\nbranding SC decisions as balu teendu (decision by dogs?), his intention was\ncrystal clear. He did not apologize. On the pending case against Ranjan\nRamanayaka for condemning the court system as corrupt, his purpose in doing\nthat is fuzzy. When Nagananda Kodituwakku goes to SC with briefs against SC\njudges, Chief Justice, or the AG, no one said his purpose was not noble. The\nway BBS monk was trapped using clause 105 of the constitution is unique. The\nmagistrate Ranga Dissanayake had a dialogue with the monk and the monk accepted\nhis mistake, gave an explanation as to why he had to talk, and apologized twice\nand went on to ask the judge in the Gandhian style to impose appropriate\npunishment for his behavior. All this is on the video clip. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The magistrate could have fined him, imprison\nhim for the day, warn him or sent him to jail for a longer duration. The\nmagistrate was aware that he was dealing not with a solitary monk, but a kind\nof national entity. He would have settled it in a casual manner, if not for the\nintervention of the AG dept lawyer Dileepa Peiris and the JVP-connected lawyer\nUpul Kumarapperuma, who appeared for the wife of an allegedly disappeared\nperson, Ekneligoda.  With their intervention, the magistrate lost his\njudicial independence and discretion. A minor incident became a national issue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The facts of the case, the reaction of the\nmagistrate as recorded on the video, do not justify his subsequent opinion,\nthat the monk should be punished severely, and for that purpose he wanted to\nreport the monk\u2019s behavior to CA, because he has no power to impose a\npunishment like 19 years of rigorous imprisonment. In S.B. Dissanayake\u2019s case\nthe complaint was by ordinary citizens, perhaps motivated by partisan politics.\nIn BBS case, it was instigated by two biased lawyers who found a golden\nopportunity to trap the monk for his work in exposing the black-whites\u2019 game.\nIt is clear from the evidence gave by the magistrate that he had to make a case\nin narrating what had happened, so that he could justify why he wanted to\nreport the incident to CA for severe punishment instead of a lighter punishment\nthat he could have given then and there. The lawyer for the monk argued on this\nbasis, but CA refused to accept it. The million-dollar question is why the\ncourt did not see the video clip, which makes court\u2019s position untenable!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Objective\/Subjective\nTest<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is a common belief that a judge usually has\nan opinion formed already about the case pending before him and gathers facts\nand evidence that he could use to justify his decision. Often, words and\nstatements in the judgement provide hints as to the way a judge\u2019s mind was\nworking. The following are examples reflective of the subjective nature of the\njudgement (the statements copied from the judgement are categorized; my\ncomments are in italics below each category).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*1. High quality of\nlawyers as witnesses<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

[Magistrate] was severely cross examined;\n[SSC] was severely cross-examined at length; [private attorney] faced continuous\nquestioning by the accused\u2019s attorney.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The judgement states the three lawyers who\ngave evidence against the monk faced three different levels of testing. What\ndid the judges expect to achieve by these adjectives on cross examination of\nthe witnesses? Did the court mean that the accused\u2019s side faced only mild\/soft\ncross examination?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dileepa Peiris and Upul Kumarapperuma\ncorroborated magistrate\u2019s evidence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The three lawyers who\nwere directly responsible for the filing of the case are not going to do\nanything different than corroborating!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*2. accused\ncorroborated Magistrate\u2019s evidence<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

a. accused\u2019s lawyer and his two witnesses\ndenied accused saying impotent but accused admitted it;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

b. accused\u2019s two witnesses lied;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

c. accused lied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These statements\ndemonstrate that the monk was honest, but his lawyer made some technical\nerrors. For example, no lawyer will use\/call witnesses who will put the accused\nin trouble.  Unless the court is determined to teach a lesson to the\naccused, these are so trivial in a case like this. This is not a murder trial.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*3. accused said\nmagistrate was a good magistrate, if so, why would<\/strong> magistrate gave bad evidence against the accused?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When AG\u2019s lawyer asked\nthis tricky question, the monk could not give an answer. But CA used it against\nthe monk. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This change of\nmagistrate\u2019s mind was due to the two lawyers who influenced the magistrate to\nact at the time of the incident. The issue was not a good magistrate became a\nbad magistrate. The issue should be why the monk\u2019s mind changed at that moment.\nIt was his loss of hope of the release of accused soldiers, whom he considered\nas national heroes. His sudden loss of mind and body control was triggered by\nthe tear drops of re-remanded soldiers fell on his hand. See how one incident\ncould be twisted to get the outcome one wants!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*4. address was not in\nthe form of plea-<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

a. not a peaceful dialogue;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

b. addressed the court in high tone being emotionally<\/strong> aroused;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

c. accused tried to intimidate magistrate to\nreverse his order;<\/p>\n\n\n\n

this is white man\u2019s law. We do not accept this\nlaw. Therefore, give bail to these war heroes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The monk did not intervene when the case was\nbeing heard. He did not disrupt that case. He spoke after it was over, and the\nremand prisoners were taken out.  The video clip does not justify, what\nthe court was imagining. Again, was this an incident\/offence warranting a\nrigorous jail term of 19 years? Unlike what S.B. Dissanayaka or Ranjan\nRamanayaka said the remark about the white man\u2019s law is a political comment not\ndirected at courts or judges.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Note that the court also accepts emotional\nelement coming within the exception of grave and sudden provocation in criminal\nlaw).<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*5. impotent\ngovernment\u2019s some officers\/impotent officers (obscene words)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

sit-down, you, impotent state lawyer (to\nDileepa Peiris)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

this type of treacherous government officers<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The monk was accused\nof uttering these words. Other than the words directed at Dileepa Peiris, there\nwas no insult to an individual but to the government in general. Napunsakaya in\nSinhala usage does not mean impotent in its biological English language meaning,\nbut as one who is a puppet without principles in its sociological context. A\nbarren person is not called a napunsakaya in Sinhala. A man acting like a woman\nand vice versa is called a napunsakaya. Judges should have obtained experts\u2019\nadvice in this regard.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\nhttp:\/\/www.colombotoday.com\/54927-23\/\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\nhttps:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=iwUhCS25hhE\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

*6. JVP\nconnection\/protection of Buddhism<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CA went on to state\nthat lawyer Kumarapperuma (Ekneligoda\u2019s wife\u2019s lawyer) said that he was not\nanti-Buddhist and that his links with JVP (he contested 2015 election as a JVP\ncandidate) has nothing to do with the truthfulness of the evidence he gave. He\nwas the only non-state lawyer against the accused. By this statement CA\nwhitewashes Kumarapperuma\u2019s evidence used as another corroboration of\nmagistrate\u2019s evidence.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

*7. Only lawyers can\naddress the judges in court<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CA was clearly erroneous here. Any accused can\nrepresent himself in a court of law; Any person can address a court with\npermission. The accused monk even though he has no direct link with this case\nwas representing the close relatives (their wives) of the remanded war heroes.\nThey went to his temple and begged the monk repetitively to do something for\ntheir relatives in remand for months without any charges filed against them.\nThe monk was the only outlet they had to disclose the political nature of the\narrests. After all, there are some doubts as to whether Ekneligoda is hiding in\nDubai. His disappearance is used for political purposes by a napunsaka\ngovernment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Any reasonable person watching the video clip\nattached cannot help but have doubts about the way the Court of Appeal handled\nthe BBS case, and the harsh punishment given to a public service monk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The president has referred the appeal for his\npardon to AG for advice. An AG\u2019s Dept. who marched overboard to fix this monk\ncannot expect to be impartial in this regard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Therefore, the lawyers of the monk need to\nmake either a fundamental rights appeal or a fresh appeal to the president to\nrelease the monk from prison. There are strong reasons to doubt the legality\nand reasonableness of the CA decision. (cwije77@outlook.com\/wijeychandra@gmail.com)\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Next: Part 4 -The Lore of the Law and other\nmemories<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

C. Wijeyawickrema, LL.B., Ph.D. How did the 2 court of appeal judges and the 2 supreme court judges who refused Ven. G\u2019s permission to appeal, miss this video clip? Six lawyers and a monk: importance of impotence Posted on January 22nd, 2019 – Lankaweb Part II-continuation It is strange why the monk\u2019s lawyers did not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-111034","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-c-wijeyawickrema"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111034","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111034"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111034\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}