NEW DELHI: The Kerala High Court has commuted the death sentence of Nino Mathew, convicted in the 2014 double murder case in Attingal, to life imprisonment.
The court stipulated that Mathew will be ineligible for parole for the first 25 years of his sentence. The division bench also upheld the double life sentence of the second accused, Anusanthi, a friend of Mathew.
Justices PB Suresh Kumar and Johnson John delivered separate judgments supporting the decision to quash the death penalty. The judgment begins with Chanakya’s dictum that “there is no disease as destructive as lust.” The case involved the murder of an innocent child and a helpless woman, with Nino Mathew charged with murder. Both Mathew and Anusanthi were convicted of murder, criminal conspiracy, attempting to destroy evidence, and theft.
The court exempted Mathew from the death penalty, citing favorable circumstances, including the fact that he was not a habitual offender and did not pose a significant threat to society. The judges concluded that the case did not fall under the “rarest of the rare” category, thus making the death sentence unnecessary. Justice Johnson John noted that the effective punishment period would be around 25 years. Additionally, both accused are required to pay a fine of fifty lakh rupees, as determined by the trial court.
The division bench ruled that the penalties for the various offenses could be served concurrently.
Previously on April 16, 2016, Nino Mathew allegedly stabbed Anusanthi’s three-and-a-half-year-old daughter and her husband’s mother to death at Anusanthi’s house in Attingal, Thiruvananthapuram. Both Mathew and Anusanthi were employees of Technopark at the time.