By Matters India Reporter
Kochi, Dec. 1, 2021: The Kerala High Court on December 1 reduced the duration of jail term of a former Catholic priest, who was convicted for raping and impregnating a teenager.
The bench of Justice Narayana Pisharoty heard the appeal of Robin Vadakkumchery against the 20-year rigorous imprisonment awarded to him February 16, 2019, by a court dealing with POCSO (Protection of Children Against Sexual Offences Act) cases.
The high court has now reduced the term to ten years.
The 54-year-old former priest was convicted for raping and impregnating a teenage parishioner when he was the parish priest of St Sebastian’s Church of Kottiyoor under Mananthavady diocese.
The rape case came to light after the victim delivered a baby boy in December 2016 at Christuraja Hospital in Kuthuparamba in Kannur district. Childline India officials alerted the police and a case was registered February 27, 2017. The girl was then shifted to an adoption center managed by nuns.
Vadakkumchery was arrested February 28, 2017, as he was trying to escape to Canada.
The POSCO court found him guilty on three counts involving rape and gave him 20 years for each for every charge. However, he was allowed to spend only 20 years in prison as the charges were concurrent.
The court also fined 300,000 rupees.
Judge P N Vinod of the POSCO court in Thalassery, a town in northern Kerala, ordered him to another 150,000 rupees to the victim.
The court acquitted other six accused, including three nuns and a priest, as the prosecution failed to prove the charges against them.
In July 2020, Vadakkumchery urged the Kerala High Court to suspend his sentence for two months to enable him marry the victim, who had by then attained the legal age for marriage.
In his plea, Vadakkumchery said the only impediment to the marriage was his priesthood, which did not exist after the Pope defrocked him.
After the Kerala dismissed his plead amid protests from the public prosecutor, Vadakkumchery went to the Supreme Court in New Delhi. The apex court too dismissed the petitions from Vadakkumchery and his victim seeking bail to marry each other.