Authors: Alex Josey
Jean and I took the Fiat car and went to
Abad Century and we went into the Coffee House. At the Coffee House I met two
of my old classmates, Jamaluddin Hassan and Hashim Kadir who had come from
Kuala Trengganu and Kuantan respectively to attend a conference in Kuala
Lumpur. I invited them to join us but they told me they had other friends and
so they left.
At about 10:15
pm
, Jean and I went up to the piano lounge of Century Hotel.
There I had a few beers and we listened to music and also danced. At about
11:00
pm
, we left Century Hotel
to go back to Klang.”
Karthigesu said that at the Jalan 222
traffic lights he saw Jean waving and she told him that it was Adrian and his
wife. He said: “She told me what a coincidence because she was thinking of her
husband when she had to see Adrian de Silva, who was a friend of her husband.
As we came towards the Subang Jaya bypass I
took the underpass because I wanted to urinate and as I stopped the car and
opened the door, another car came beside my car and three men pulled me out of
the car. And as I was being pulled, I noticed another man squeeze past me into
the car. I could hear Jean shouting ‘Selvam! Selvam!’. These three men had
weapons one of which was put near my hips. It was sharp and the other man,
holding my collar, held something near my neck.”
At that time the car, said Karthigesu,
reversed and his head facing Klang was dragged along with it. He said: “I could
see shadows of struggle inside the car and I struggled with these people. I
could hear Jean screaming. I was shocked, I was frightened. I could not think
or react because of this sudden change in what I had experienced and what I was
experiencing. I pleaded and at that time I used abusive words. I was hit many
times on my head by one of the men who was having a crash helmet.
There were a lot of cars passing that way
and I was wondering why none was stopping. Things were happening so fast but I
can distinctly remember the warning given to me that I should not tell the
police what I saw but just say that I was assaulted and that thereafter I knew
nothing. They warned me that if I tried to seek police help they will get
Jean’s children, my mother and finally me. They brought me towards the gate and
asked me to lie down and when I did not do so they pushed me down and when I
tried to get up, the man with the crash helmet continued to hit me. After this
I could only remember when the police vehicle took me to hospital.
When I was in hospital I began to experience
something which I have never experienced in my whole life. I could hear people
asking me questions. I could remember answering some questions. The next
morning I remember going back to Klang with Brian and James Ritchie. I
categorically deny that I told anyone of them that I was getting married to
Jean on the 13. Looking back from now, my Lord, I could have said all our plans
of moving house before 14 April were shattered. I could have just mumbled these
words. I attended the funeral and the feast in Kajang and it was on this day
that I met and saw Richard Jayatilake but I have heard of his name mentioned by
Mrs Perera many times when I visited her in 1978 and 1979. Jean also mentioned his
name and I was warned to be careful in my association with him.
During the feast after the funeral, this
Richard came and talked very kindly to me and asked me to drink beer with him
but I told him that it was a tradition in our family, if anyone close passes
away we go vegetarian for 31 days and abstain from taking any alcohol. Then on
16 April this Richard came to my house together with a detective, but Mr
Richard came earlier than the detective. The detective came and told me that a
police officer was coming to see me in the house that evening and that was why
he was there. After about 10 minutes the detective asked permission to use my
phone. He told me the officer who was supposed to come was not in and therefore
he left. Mr Richard then told me his purpose of coming to see me. He wanted me
to stand surety for a $3,000 loan that he wanted to take from MCIS. I told him
I was not a member of MCIS but he told me he would pay the entrance fee and two
months’ subscription and all I had to do was to sign the form. He gave me some
Coates Brothers diaries.
As soon as he left I rang up Mrs Perera in
Kajang and told her what I had done for Richard and Mrs Perera told me that I
was a fool for having signed the loan form because Richard was owing money
everywhere and that he would not hesitate to put anybody into trouble. I
categorically deny having uttered all that he has alleged that I have uttered.
As far as I am concerned Jayatilake is a total stranger to me and that was the
first time he had come to my house. I treated him decently and obliged by
signing the loan form.
On 13 April, my Lord, a police party came to
my house which included ASP Ramli, DSP Cornelius and a few detectives and they
inspected the room where Jean was staying. They took possession of many of her
belongings including the love letters from Dr Narada. I saw these letters for
the first time together with ASP Ramli and DSP Cornelius. I therefore
categorically deny, my Lord, that I took 15 to 16 letters to Kajang and showed
them to Brian and his mother in December 1978.
In fact on the evening of the 13 when I went
to Kajang with my mother to attend the prayer service for Jean, I told Brian
about the police findings. Brian then invited me out to a coffee shop to talk
in more detail about these letters as there were many visitors in the house
then. I was however unable to give him much detail because ASP Ramli did not
allow me to read them. And when we came back from the coffee shop, Brian’s
mother asked me what the secret was between me and Brian, and after some
hesitation I told her. Mrs Perera asked me why I had not destroyed them, why I
had not made a search of the room before the police arrived and destroyed all
such things because they would subsequently cause a lot of embarrassment for
our families. Therefore my Lord I had no knowledge of Jean’s intimate love for
Dr Narada before April 13 1979.”
Karthigesu said he was arrested on 26 April
and was kept at Petaling Jaya police station where he was subjected to
interrogation and also given much information by the police about Jean.
They told me that Jean was unfaithful to me.
They told me she was unfaithful to many other men. They told me she was even
unfaithful to my brother and they subjected me to all forms of humiliation and
they drummed into my mind that there is a name which I should be able to
recall, that I’m having a mental block and that this would come out if I
subjected myself to narco-analysis. My Lord, in my own studies I know a little
bit about narco-analysis and this little bit, unfortunately, is about the
ill-effects of narco-analysis. They told me if I agreed willingly to
narco-analysis that it would be a strong point for me for showing co-operation
with the police. I was unable to make up my mind and I was constantly reminded
that I could remember a name and that I should remember a name and that if I go
through with narco-analysis I am co-operating with the police.”
Karthigesu said he told the police officers
to allow him to speak either to Mr Ponnudurai or his friend Dr Chan Hong Leng
but he never got the privilege.
He said on 3 May he went to see Professor G.
Devadass accom-panied by ASP Ramli, DSP Godwin and a detective.
“I explained to Professor Devadass the
humiliations and torture that I was undergoing and told him all that the police
had told me about Jean. I did not tell the professor that I had consulted Mr
Ponnudurai and Dr Chan. I told him I had asked police permission to meet either
one of them in relation to the narco-analysis. I did not tell the professor
that Jean was unfaithful to my brother but I told him the police are telling me
things to this effect. I complained to the professor about the treatment I was
getting from the police. He was just listening to me. If he said I was with him
for one hour and ten minutes, I would have spent the major part of the time
telling him about the treatment I was getting from the police, the humiliation
I was undergoing and very little time was spent about the narco-analysis or my
description about the incident. My Lord, when I saw him I thought it was a
right opportunity for me to tell somebody about the way the police was treating
me. That was my main point of conversation with the professor.
The DPP’s Claim
The DPP claimed that the prosecution
had adduced overwhelming evidence against Karthigesu, the cumulative effect of
which pointed a finger to him as the murderer. Karthigesu should be called upon
to make his defence. Karthigesu, he said, must explain all the contradictions
in his behaviour and the contradictions in his statements to various people.
The DPP argued that there was a ‘tactical onus’ on Karthigesu either to produce
evidence on his own or point out something in the prosecution evidence that at
the very least made the Court less than sure of any conclusions it might otherwise
be prepared to base on the prosecution’s evidence.
“If the accused fails to discharge that
tactical onus he will be convicted,” the DPP said. “The prosecution,” he added,
“had to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt, but it did not have to prove beyond
a shadow of doubt.”
Mr Sambanthamurthi traced the movements of
Karthigesu from the time he had been seen at the junction of the Federal
Highway and Jalan 222 at about 11:10
pm
on 6 April 1979. According to the investigating officer ASP Ramli, it took
about three minutes to go from the junction to the scene of the crime.
The DPP said prosecution witness Encik Abdul
Wahab bin Abu Amin had passed the spot at 11:30
pm
. followed shortly after by another witness, Encik Ramli
Othman. The first person to see the car and Karthigesu on the ground was MAS
maintenance engineer Cheah Wei Keong who passed at 11:40
pm
. Between 11:30–11:40
pm
, a period of 10 minutes, Karthigesu
was not seen lying behind the car.” The DPP said this meant Karthigesu had
about 27 minutes for the killing and seven minutes for cleaning up. There was a
pond nearby where Karthigesu washed himself.
On the alleged holiday which Karthigesu and
Jean had in Pangkor Island on 31 March and 1 April 1979, the DPP said there
were two bills in the name of Karthigesu. Although the bills showed there were
two people there was no evidence Karthigesu was with Jean. The defence produced
some photographs but there was no evidence when and where they were taken.
The DPP said Karthigesu’s intention in
handing over to the police the birthday card Jean had sent Karthigesu on his
37th birthday along with four love letters Jean wrote to him was to show that
Jean loved him even on 24 March 1979. There was evidence from the letters of
Jean’s Sri Lankan lover, Dr Narada Warnasurya, that at that time she was
vacillating between her love for Karthigesu and her love for Dr Warnasurya. At
first Jean was in love with Karthigesu. She wrote the love letters to
Karthigesu between 11 June and 2 July, 1978. Jean met Dr Warnasurya on 6
September that year and the doctor’s letters to her were between 26–27 December
1978.
The DPP said no doubt the birthday card
which Jean sent to Karthigesu was one meant for a sweetheart because he was her
ex-lover, an old flame. If Karthigesu wanted the Court to believe Jean was
still in love with him because she sent the birthday card and that they had
plans to marry, then he should go into the witness box and explain. At one time
Jean loved Karthigesu but when she sent the birthday card she was already in
love with someone else who was prepared to marry her and provide her security.
“If she did not send the card, he would immediately connect her with Dr
Warnasurya.” At that time Jean was already imposing conditions on Karthigesu.
She was not so seriously in love with him then as she was the previous year.
Jean’s condition was that Karthigesu should live with her separately because
she did not want to live with her mother-in-law. This was supported by the fact
that she went house-hunting and the evidence of her brother, who said Jean was
not happy living with her mother-in-law. Jean’s main problem was that she had
no privacy in the house. She, her servant and her three children all had to
sleep in the same room.
The fact that she had no privacy was borne
out by the letters she wrote to Karthigesu while they lived under the same
roof.
The DPP went on to say that it was the
defence contention that because Karthigesu went house-hunting with Jean he had
plans to move out with her after the Hindu New Year on 14 April, 1979. But
there was the evidence of two housing agents that Karthigesu did not take an
interest when Jean went to view a house in Bungsar and another in Jalan Mewah,
Petaling Jaya.
Turning to the evidence of Professor
Devadass, the consultant psychiatrist, and Bandhulananda Jayatilake, it was
clear Karthigesu had a feeling of hatred towards Jean which began in December
1978, when he discovered the letters Dr Warnasurya wrote and he had created a
scene at her mother’s house in Kajang. Professor Devadass had said Karthigesu
did not show any feeling of warmth towards Jean. He felt mostly anger and he
did not show that her death was a personal tragedy. Professor Devadass had said
Karthigesu referred to Jean as ‘this woman’ and ‘that woman’, he had complained
that she had been unfaithful to many men for a long time and that she had been
so even when her husband was alive. It could be seen that Karthigesu was not in
love with her at that point. In fact he harboured a grudge against her because
she was an unfaithful woman.