NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday commuted death penalty of man for he was kept in a solitary confinement at Belagavi jail for a period of 10 years without sanction of law, causing "ill-effect on his well being".
"The appellant is entitled to have the death sentence imposed upon him to be commuted to death sentence to life," a bench of Chief Justice U U Lalit and Justices S Ravindra Bhat and Bela M Trivedi said.
The court, however, directed he should undergo minimum sentence of 30 years without any remission.
"Considering the entirety of facts and circumstances on record, in our view, ends of justice would be met if while commuting the death sentence awarded to the appellant, we impose upon him sentence of life imprisonment with a rider that he shall undergo minimum sentence of 30 years and if any application for remission is moved on his behalf, the same shall be considered on its own merits only after he has undergone actual sentence of 30 years," the bench said.
An ex-police constable, B A Umesh alias Umesh Reddy had gained notoriety for his sex crimes, allegedly raping women and their murders.
In 2016, the top court had rejected his review plea against the sentence of death penalty imposed on him for raping and murdering a widow in Bengaluru's Peenya Police Station limits on February 28, 1998.
He approached the top court against the Karnataka High Court's order of September 29, 2021 which dismissed his plea for quashing the rejection of his mercy plea due to inordinate delay.
He also assailed the decision to keep him in solidarity confinement since trial court awarded death penalty to him in 2006.
Noting the facts of the matter, the bench pointed out it took two years and three months in disposal of his mercy petitions at the levels of the President and the Governor and in the entire period between March 3, 2011 and May 12, 2013, a stay of his execution by this court remained in operation.
"The time taken by each of these authorities and the functionaries assisting them cannot be called or termed as inordinate delay and secondly, it was not as if every passing day was adding to the agony of appellant. The order of stay of execution had put the matter in a different perspective," the bench said.
In the instant case, the death sentence was awarded to the appellant in 2006 by the trial court and the mercy petition was finally disposed of by the President on May 12, 2013. However, he was kept in solitary confinement for a period of 10 years.
"The incarceration in solitary confinement thus did show ill effects on the well-being of the appellant. In the backdrop of these features, in our view, the appellant is entitled to have the death sentence imposed upon him to be commuted to death sentence to life," the court said.
In the judgement, the top court also explained that the mercy petition can be filed by a death row convict after exhaustion of all remedies in court of law and not merely within seven days of rejection of appeal.
Read Judgement
