FSL assures legal backing for them

Families of those sentenced to death by the Three-member Gampaha High Trial-at-Bar, over the killing of SLPP MP Amarakeerthi Atukorale, and his police bodyguard, met a senior official of the Presidential Secretariat, yesterday (23), to seek backing for their move to appeal against the verdict.

Having made representations, they addressed the media, outside the Presidential Secretariat, where they declared their intention to move the higher court against the decision.

The SLPP MP and his security officer were killed by an Aragalaya mob on 09 May, 2022, at Nittambuwa. The same day Aragalaya mobs unleashed violence against the then government MPs across the country, torching dozens of their properties.

The Frontline Socialist Party (FSP) yesterday said that they would help the families of those sentenced to death to move court against the Gampaha High Court Trial-at-Bar decision. Responding to The Island queries, FSP spokesman Pubudu Jayagoda said that their representatives had already met the families and necessary work was being done to move the Supreme Court. Twenty three persons were acquitted and four handed six-month prison terms, suspended for five years

Jayagoda said that one of the HC judges differed in the ruling. Asked whether they received backing from any other political party and groups that had been involved in the 2022 protest campaign to defend those who had been found guilty, Jayagoda said such support was lacking.

The JVP/NPP played a significant role in the violent protest campaign that forced President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to step down. Pointing out that the Attorney General, too, was appealing against the court decision on the basis that the number of persons sentenced to death should be much higher, Jayagoda said that the Nittambuwa incident couldn’t be examined in isolation without taking into consideration the SLPP goon attack on Galle Face protesters on 09 May, 2022. (SF)