‘Cyanide’ Mohan conviction: The woman who helped prosecution convict the infamous criminal

MANGALURU: For more than nine years, legal officers, along with law enforcement agencies, have been fighting a long battle to get the infamous ‘Cyanide’ Mohan, accused in 20 cases, convicted. A key witness who has been invaluable to the prosecution is a survivor, the efforts and courage of whom earned her praise from public prosecutor Jayarama Shetty.
Thus far, Mohan has been acquitted in five of the 20 cases he has been named as an accused in, while the high court has sentenced him to death in two of these cases, said Shetty.
Mohan had introduced himself to the survivor and key witness, Shetty said, by posing as Sudhakar Achary. “He claimed to be her distant relative, and told her he was employed in Kudremukh in the forest department. In April 2009, promising her a job in a garment factory and took her to a hotel in Madikeri, where he allegedly had intercourse with her against her will. He asked her to leave behind all her jewellery, and took her to the KSRTC bus stand. There, he told her to take a powder, which he assured her was a contraceptive,” the public prosecutor said.
The staff at the bus stand subsequently found her lying unconscious, and rushed her to the government hospital. However, she did not disclose the ordeal she had gone through to the staff at the hospital. It was only after Mohan’s arrest that she decided to offer her statement as a witness. “There are three common witnesses in Mohan’s cases, including a block education officer and a priest, whom he visited after committing murder, seeking expiation for his sins,” Shetty added.
Prior to Shetty, Cheyabba Beary, Shivaprasad Alva and Judith OM Crasta have appeared in court as prosecutors in the case, the proceedings of which started at Mangaluru’s fasttrack court in November 2011.
Mohan aka Anand was first arrested in October 2009 in Bantwal taluk, for his alleged involvement in the murder of 20 women in Dakshina Kannada and neighbouring Kasaragod districts. His modus operandi largely involved taking women to remote locations, where he poisoned them using cyanide, before making away with their jewellery. A teacher, Mohan reportedly married thrice, while his criminal record has entries dating as far back as 2000. In fact, investigation into one of the cases, wherein a girl was reported missing, Mohan was involved in that helped Dakshina Kannada police arrest him. This had been a controversial case with several organisations alleging that the girl had been a victim of Love Jihad.