Nun 'abused' by priest appears before court seeks to engage lawyer

Why popular secular media channels are silent on this. Is it because Hindus are not involved in this ?

Trichy  (Tamilnadu) : All the five accused in the Sister Florence Mary rape case appeared before the mahila court in Trichy on Wednesday, even as the victim submitted a petition before the judge, seeking permission to officially engage a lawyer for the prosecution, along with the public prosecutor before the start of the trial.

Meanwhile, defence lawyer A Rajendran, who appeared for Fr Rajarathinam, a Jesuit priest and accused number one in the case, asked the judge to grant more time to counter the victim's plea. Judge Rahman posted the hearing to May 28.

Fr Rajarathinam, the former principal of St Joseph's College, Trichy was accused by Florence Mary (31), a former member of St Anne's congregation in Trichy, of rape in 2006 and later in 2008. The priest was granted anticipatory bail by the Madras high court on November 3, 2010 after he allegedly went underground for over a month.

The other accused in the case were Fr Provincial Mudiappasamy Devadoss, Fr Joe Xavier, Fr Xavier Vedam, the principal of Arulanandar College, Karumathur and Dr Suchitra attached to Kavery hospital, Trichy who had allegedly conducted the abortion on the nun who was allegedly raped by Fr Rajaranthinam.

Fr Devadoss, and Fr Joe Xavier were charged under section 506 (1) (Criminal intimidation), Fr Xavier Vedam under section 506(1) and also the Women's Harassment Act (section 4) and Dr Suchitra under sections 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence) and 313 (causing miscarriage without woman's consent).

Advocate Irudayasamy, who appeared for Florence Mary said that the victim had every right to engage a lawyer and said that the prosecution had also staked its claim to cross-examine the defence witnesses during the trial.

The petitioner's counsel also said the names of two lawyers were proposed so that when one was absent, the other would officially appear on behalf of the victim. The police had filed an 88-page charge-sheet before the judicial magistrate-I Illangovan on June 21 last year. The case was then transferred to the district principal sessions judge who on February 23 this year transferred the case to the mahila court asking all the parties to appear there on March 12.

Source : TOI