Madras High Court grants bail to woman accused of sponsoring BSP leader Armstrong’s murder

The Madras High Court has granted bail to a woman accused of sponsoring the 2024 murder of Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) former State president K. Armstrong because she wanted to take revenge, denied bail to a co-accused, cancelled the bail granted by a sessions court to 12 other accused persons and confirmed the bail granted by the trial court to two more of the 30 people roped in the case.

Justice K. Rajasekar granted bail to S. Porkodi, who had been charged for the offence of giving her deceased husband Arcot Suresh’s 10 sovereign gold bracelet which was reportedly pledged for ₹3.56 lakh to procure vehicles and to provide accommodation to the assailants of Armstrong. The judge took into consideration that the petitioner was a woman who had been incarcerated for long.

Though the prosecution claimed that it was in possession of call detail records to prove that she was constantly in touch with the assailants for eliminating those she perceived to be responsible for her husband’s death, the judge said, the charge against her was only of generating the money required for the murder and “there is no allegation that she had active participation in the commission of the offence.”

The judge, however, refused to grant bail to advocate K. Haridharan, who had been arrayed as the nineteenth accused in the case and charged with the offence of transferring funds to the co-accused and destroying evidence by breaking six mobile phones and throwing them in to the River Kosasthalaiyar. The police had recovered those mobile phones using scuba divers and sent them for forensic analysis.

Further, passing orders on a petition filed by the police to cancel the bail granted by a sessions court to 14 other accused, the judge cancelled the bail granted to 12 of them and confirmed the bail granted to the rest. The judge said, the sessions court had not properly appreciated the gravity of the charges levelled against the 12 accused before granting bail and hence they must surrender before the trial court by March 6, 2026.

The 12 accused were: Ashwathaman (A3), Pradeep (A16), Hariharan (A17), Sathishkumar (A20), Siva (A21), Appu alias Pudur Appu (A22), Mukilan (A23), Noor alias Vijay alias Vijayakumar (A24), Vignesh alias Appu (A25), Rajesh (A26), Gopi (A27) and Kumara alias Senthilkumar (A28). Some of them have now filed petitions seeking extension of the time, fixed by the court for them to surrender, by four weeks.

The two accused whose bail, granted by the sessions court, was left untouched by the High Court were the 29th accused Anjalai and 30th accused S. Malarkodi.