Petition of Esther dismissed as withdrawn

CHENNAI: The Madras High Court has dismissed as withdrawn a habeas corpus writ petition from Dr J Esther (61) of Karur seeking the release of her son John David, the lone accused in the Navarasu murder case.Navarasu, a medico, was brutally murdered and his limbs were found in a transport corporation bus in 1996. The police in Cuddalore arrested John David, another medico, and registered a case. The Principal Sessions Judge in Cuddalore convicted him to life imprisonment in March, 1998. However, a division bench of the Madras HC, by orders dated October 5, 2001, acquitted him of all charges and ordered his release. The matter was taken to the SC, which on April 20 this year, reversed the order of the Madras HC and restored the conviction imposed by the trial court.In her present petition, Esther referred to a recent judgment of the Supreme Court, which had held that an adolscent offender should be detained in a Borstal school only up to the age of 23 and he could not be sent back to the prison to serve the remaining part of the sentence. Therefore, the detention of her son in the central prison, though he had crossed 23 years of age now, was illegal as he was an adolscent offender.When the matter came up today, a division bench raised jurisdictional issue and Esther’s counsel opted to withdraw the petition reserving his right to raise the plea before the appropriate court.