Looking Back Detail Page

01 Apr

- Michael Joseph – When in Std VI

On a sunny day, my friends and I were playing 'catching-cooke'. It was about 5 o'clock in the evening when my friend was chasing me and I was run¬ning towards the left side of the "Twelve Palms" building, when I heard a groan. I ran up to see what had happened and to my surprise I saw Mr. X. fallen to the side of the staircase, (the passage of the house), and I saw a man pall out his knife from Mr. X.' s back. I wanted to run away but I was crippled for a moment. As I ran I turned around and saw the mur¬derer showing the knife to the two police¬men who were on duty, and defying them.
I took my friend and ran away to my house. My horror was so great, because of the incident, that I couldn't bear being left alone. No! not even at night. To overcome my fright, and as a source of consolation, my friend's mother insisted that. I’d sleep with my friend or vice versa. The next morning a CID came to my house and asked my friend if we saw anything of the murder; having learnt that we did, he asked us to accompany him to the Police Station. At the Police Station, after a wait of about fifteen minutes, we were taken to a place where six men were presented before us and I was asked to pick out the man. My legs were giving way and I was a mass of nerves at first, but having prayed for strength, and plucking up courage, I picked him out; immedi¬ately he was hand-cuffed. Then we were asked to identify the knife of the mur¬derer; it didn't take me time to identify the knife because it was still blood-stained. For a moment I felt my services were done with, but to my surprise I was asked to go back to the place where this murder occurred. Seated in the police jeep with a police¬man and two C.I.D we were driven to the spot. On arriving, we practically demon¬strated the scene, answering a number of questions. There was a month's pause, before I was summoned to the Court. There I was asked by the Judge a score or more of questions like "Where do you live?" "Where did you hear the scream?" "On what day and about what time?" "Which side of the building were you?" "Were there any cars on that side?" How many friends did you have?" and so on. The case lasted for five hours. You could imagine my plight sitting in the witness ¬box and answering questions like the above and even others.
Two months later I was summoned to the High Court, and again I was put questions and more questions. I was first asked to sit on a chair in the witness-box but being short. I wasn't visible at all. Then I was asked to stand up and made to swear on oath. Again I was detained in Court for five hours. The lawyer for the accused tried to put me oft with his twisted questions but did not succeed. He asked me if I was on the left side of the building, to which I replied "Yes". After a little while he asked me if I was on the right side of the building and I replied "On the left side". Then the lawyer went on and said, "Suppose you were the murderer and I was the police, how far were you from me?" Be¬fore I could say anything, the judge who was quite humorous said: "No! Suppose you were the murderer and Maurice was the police". There was laughter for a while. There were many questions that I was asked but they were far beyond my comprehension and to which I didn't reply. I cannot remember everything. But all I know and do remember was that he was sentenced for life too hard labour. All through I was under police protection!