Vavuniya Judge gets jurisdiction over Mullaitivu

[TamilNet, Wednesday, 30 July 2003, 03:47 GMT]
The Judicial Services Commission of Sri Lanka has appointed the Vavuniya District judge, Mr. M. Ilanceliyan, to function as the District judge and Magistrate for the Mullaitivu district since June 1, sources said.

The Vavuniya District court has been granted the jurisdiction over cases involving violence, sudden deaths and arrests in land and sea in the Mullaitivu district, according to the JSC’s appointment letter.

The appointment gives the legal authority to the Vavuniya judge to investigate sudden deaths as a result of accidents on the A-9 highway and the postmortem inquiry of the corpses brought to Vavuniya as a result of such accidents.

In a recent case involving an abduction of a vehicle to, and triple murder in, Thadchanamaruthamadu in the Madhu area, when the Vavuniya judge started investigations, a legal controversy arose over the proper jurisdiction of the court. It became necessary to first determine whether the place was in the Mullaitivu district or the Mannar district.

More recently, when a corpse was brought to the Vavuniya hospital as a result of an accident in the Mankulam area of the Mullaitivu district, the inquiry could not be properly completed because of the lack of jurisdiction by the Vavuniya court. The JSC’s appointment granting the Vavuniya judge jurisdiction over the Mullaitivu district has made such inquiries by the Judge legally valid.

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