Actress sexual assault: Crime Branch opposes Dileep\'s anticipatory bail plea

Kochi: The Crime Branch wing of the Kerala police on Thursday filed a statement in the Kerala High Court opposing the anticipatory bail plea filed by actor Dileep in a case registered against him and five others for allegedly threatening investigation officers probing the sexual assault of an actress back in 2017.

In its statement, the Crime Branch said it is the first time in the history of Kerala that a person accused of a serious offence hatched a criminal conspiracy to harm the life of investigating officers.

"Having regards to the facts and circumstances of the case and considering the involvement of the petitioners in serious offence and that too to harm the life of the law enforcing officers of the State, the petitioners are not entitled to invoke such extraordinary discretionary remedy of pre-arrest bail," the Crime Branch said in the statement.

Besides Dileep, his younger brother —P Sivakumar —and brother-in-law— T N Suraj — have also moved the high court seeking the same relief.

The Crime Branch said the allegations against Dileep and other petitioners are 'very serious' and said custodial interrogation of the accused is required to unearth the criminal conspiracy hatched by them.

The Crime Branch had recently registered the case on a complaint filed by an investigating officer based on a purported audio clip of Dileep, which was released by a TV channel in which the actor was allegedly heard conspiring to attack the official.

The actor and five others were booked under various provisions of the Indian Penal Code, including Sections 116 (abetment), 118 (concealing design to commit offense), 120B (criminal conspiracy), 506 (criminal intimidation), and 34 (criminal act done by several people).

The joint plea moved by all three has claimed that the complaint lodged against them by the officer —DySP (Crime Branch) Baiju Paulose —was “false”.

They have contended that the allegations in the FIR, registered on the base of the complaint, are "wholly false and baseless".

The actor and his relatives have alleged, in the petition filed through advocate Philip T Varghese, that the intention behind registration of the case was to take them into custody and humiliate them before the public.

This apprehension is borne out of the past conduct of the complainant officer who right from the start has been trying to falsely implicate the actor in the sexual assault case, the petition has alleged.

The victim — an actress who has worked in Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam films — was abducted and allegedly molested inside her car for two hours by some of the accused, who had forced their way into the vehicle on the night of February 17, 2017 and later escaped in a busy area. The entire act was filmed by some of the accused to blackmail the actress.

There are 10 accused in the case and initially, police arrested seven people. Dileep was arrested subsequently and released on bail later.