Kerala High Court refuses to cancel bail granted to Dileep in actress assault case

The Kerala High Court on Wednesday refused to cancel the bail granted to Malayalam cine actor Dileep for his alleged involvement in the 2017 actress assault case [State of Kerala v P Gopalakrishnan Alias Dileep]..Justice Sophy Thomas delivered the verdict on a plea moved by the State prosecution in 2022 challenging the order of the Additional Special Session Judge, Ernakulam dismissing the State's plea to cancel the bail granted to Dileep by the High Court in 2017.However, the Court clarified that the observations made by the Sessions judge in her order refusing to cancel bail shall not affect the appreciation of evidence in the main trial. "Since the trial court has made some observations and findings in Crl.MP 891/2022 (prosecution plea to cancel bail), it may tend to appear that the learned judge has made up her mind as to the destruction of evidence, threatening the witness, etc. alleged by the prosecution. This Court is inclined to clarify Annexure E (trial court order refusing to cancel bail) as follows: It is clarified that the trial court's observations and findings in the order are only for the purpose of disposal of Crl.MP 891/2022 and it shall not affect appreciation of evidence in SC 118/2018 (main case). The learned trial judge has to appreciate the evidence in SC 118/2018 independently and untrammeled by any of the observations and findings in Annexure E Order," the High Court's order today stated..Dileep was arrested on July 10, 2017, but he was granted bail on October 3, 2017 by the High Court.The prosecution moved the High Court contending that Dileep failed to follow the bail conditions and that he and his associates were indulging in all sorts of activities, including destroying evidence and influencing prosecution witnesses.Dileep and his associates are accused of orchestrating and executing a revenge crime against a prominent actress by having her abducted and sexually assaulted in a moving vehicle.The prosecution stated that the visuals of the sexual assault were captured by the prime accused, Pulsar Suni with a view to reveal the identity of the survivor from the visuals.It is alleged that this was a revenge crime executed by Dileep as he believed that the survivor was responsible for the breakdown of his marriage with another popular Malayalam actress Manju Warrier.The accused including Dileep were initially booked for various offenses under the Indian Penal Code (IPC), including Sections 366 (kidnapping), 120B (criminal conspiracy), and 376D (gangrape).Meanwhile, Dileep was booked in yet another crime based on the allegations by film director Balachandra Kumar that Dileep had been conspiring to murder the police officers investigating the actress assault case. In that case as well, Dileep was granted anticipatory bail by the High Court in 2021.The plea moved by the prosecution narrated several alleged instances of Dileep coercing some of the prosecution witnesses such as Vipin Lal, Jinson and Sagar Vincent. However, the trial court refused to consider the statements of the witnesses in this regard when the prosecution initially approached it to cancel Dileep's bail. The prosecution had also pointed out that Sagar Vincent in particular, had approached the trial court with a separate plea in which he narrated the alleged instances of coercion.The prosecution's plea further contended that the trial court did not consider the alleged destruction of the mobile phones of the accused.