Trinco students died due to gunshot injuries- Magistrate

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 18 January 2006, 16:13 GMT]
"The court determines that the five Tamil youths killed on January 2 night near the sea beach of the east port town had died due to gunshot injuries instantaneously. The court has come to a conclusion that an offence has been committed in this instance. Therefore the court orders the Police to conduct further inquiry into these deaths and to produce the suspects before the court," said Mr.V.Ramakamalan, Trincomalee Magistrate in his order delivered Wednesday at the conclusion of the magisterial inquest, legal sources said.

Dr.Gamini Kulathunge, Judicial Medical Officer (JMO) of the Trincomalee general hospital Tuesday submitted postmortem reports of the dead students. He said all these youths had died due to gunshot injuries. Bullets had pierced through heads, lungs, liver, intestines and other vital organs of the dead youths causing their deaths instantaneously. Gunshots had been fired on youths from above, the JMO said in his evidence. He gave evidence for about four hours, legal sources said

The inquest into the deaths of five Tamil students, Manoharan Rajeehar, Thangathurai Sivanantha, Yogarajah Hemachchandran, Shanmugarajah Sajeendran and Logithasan Rohanth began in the Trincomalee magistrates' court on January 10. More evidence was recorded from January 16, on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, legal sources said.

Mr.D.Livera, Deputy Solicitor General and three other State Counsels led the evidence of the witnesses at the inquest proceedings on the instruction of the Attorney General. Mr.A.Jegasothy, Attorney-at-Law of the Trincomalee Bar watched the interests of the aggrieved parties, legal sources said.

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