Kerala HC suspends sentence of Greeshma's uncle in Sharon murder case

Thiruvananthapuram: In the sensational Sharon murder case, the Kerala High Court on Thursday suspended the three-year prison sentence of the third accused and maternal uncle of prime accused Greeshma, Nirmalakumaran Nair, who was convicted under Section 201 of the IPC for tampering with evidence.

A Division Bench, comprising Justice P B Suresh Kumar and Justice Jobin Sebastian, also admitted the appeals filed by both Greeshma and her uncle. Greeshma, who was sentenced to death by the Additional Sessions Court in Neyyattinkara last month for the murder of her boyfriend Sharon has challenged her conviction while seeking a suspension of her sentence.

In her appeal, Greeshma contends that the investigation was "highly sensationalised" and accuses authorities of running a "vilification campaign" against her to secure a conviction and impose the death penalty. The petition claims, "From the very outset, the case was sensationalised, and there was a concerted effort to portray the accused as guilty, which may have influenced the lower court's decision to impose the death sentence. The accused were denied a fair trial."

In addition, the appeal argues that Sharon's death was ruled a poisoning case “without any scientific evidence”. It further states that the case does not qualify as a ‘rarest of rare’ scenario warranting capital punishment and highlights that no mitigation study was conducted prior to sentencing.

The appeals were filed by a legal team, comprising Advocates Sreejith S Nair, Satheesh Mohanan, Mahima, Vipin Raj P, Sekhar G Thampi, Akhil Surendran, Abhishek Nair M R and Nandu Prakash J S.