Actor Assault Case: HC Judge Recuses From Plea Over Alleged Leak of Evidence

The survivor had moved the HC alleging political interference in her case's investigation.

Kerala High Court.

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Kerala High Court judge Justice Kauser Edappagath recused from hearing a plea on 14 June in the Kerala actor assault case, in which actor Dileep is an accused. The Crime Branch has approached the High Court and challenged the lower court’s order to halt the probe in the alleged leaking of evidence from the court during the course of the trial.

The Crime Branch has alleged that a memory card, which is an important piece of evidence, was found to have a change in the hash value which indicates unauthorised access.

This discrepancy was found when it was forwarded to the forensic laboratory after it was submitted before the court. The trial court had halted the inquiry into the issue.

The High Court, on 3 June, had granted an extension till 15 July to the Crime Branch to complete investigating the Kerala actor assault case.

Survivor Alleges Political Interference, Misconduct by Judge Hearing Case

The survivor, an actor who has worked in the South film industry, had approached the High Court with complaints about the way the investigation was being handled. The prosecution had submitted that the contents of the memory card purportedly containing visuals of the assault were leaked from the Principal Sessions Court in Ernakulam.

She had moved the Kerala HC with allegations that there was political interference in her case’s hearing and had alleged misconduct by Judge Honey M Varghese who was hearing her case. The survivor alleged that Judge Varghese had a forensic report since 2020 but didn’t reveal it and asked the HC to direct the trial court to release the report.

Justice Edappagath had recused from hearing the case and the survivor had also submitted a plea to the HC Registrar seeking that the plea not be heard by Edappagath.

The survivor was sexually assaulted in a car in February 2017. Actor Dileep is allegedly the mastermind of the case. Director Balachandra Kumar, who used to be Dileep’s friend, had later claimed that Dileep had visuals of the assault in his possession before they were presented in court in December 2017.