THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: 'Sharon suffered a lot of pain, this case sends a message to the society that the person you love should not be trusted. There is no law that says that maximum punishment should not be given in such cases. The argument that there is no criminal background cannot be taken into account'. These are the words of the court while awarding capital punishment to Greeshma, the first accused in the Sharon murder case that shocked Kerala. With the sentence in this case, Greeshma is the third woman to get death penalty in the state.
A woman was first awarded death sentence in the sensational Vidhukumaran Thampy murder case in Kollam in March 2006. Secondly, Rafeeka Beevi, the first accused was given capital punishment in Shantha Kumari murder case. The Neyyattinkara Additional Sessions Court awarded death sentence to Rafeeka Beevi and Greeshma. Moreover, another specialty is that the same additional district judge A M Basheer pronounced the verdict in both cases.
Binitha, the accused in the Vidhukumaran Thampy murder case, was sentenced to death in 2006. Binitha was 35 years old then. The death sentence awarded by the Kollam District Sessions Court was later commuted to life imprisonment by the higher court. Binitha is presently in the Attakkulangara Jail. The case is that Binitha and her lover Raju, a nurse at the military camp, planned the murder of Vidhukumaran Thampi, who had a shop near the Thiruvananthapuram military camp. They later took the body in a car and dumped it in a gorge in Ootty.
Awarding death sentence in Sharon murder case, 55 people are awaiting execution. 25 are in the Poojappura Central Jail alone. The last executed was 33 years ago. Ripper Chandran was hanged in the Kannur Central Jail in 1991 for killing 14 people after hitting them on the head with a hammer. The last person to be hanged in Poojappura was Azhakesan of Kaliyakkavilai in 1979. The case involved the murder of several young children for witchcraft.