The TLDR: After 28 long years, a CBI court sentenced a priest and a nun for the murder of a young woman in a Kerala convent. It is testimony to both a broken judicial system, an often complicit Church, and those who persisted despite the odds.

The crime

Sister Abhaya was a 19-year-old who was living at the hostel in the Pius X convent in Kottayam. On the morning of March 27, 1992, she was found drowned in a well located on the convent’s premises. The police immediately concluded that she died by suicide—and closed the case. 

But it was reopened within a year due to pressure from local activists, her family, and at least 65 fellow nuns—all of whom alleged that she was murdered. The case was handed over to the CBI—and dragged on for years (more on that below). In 2008, the CBI finally filed a chargesheet and laid out this theory of her murder:

• Sister Abhaya woke up very early to prepare for an exam. 
• She went to the kitchen to get some water when she stumbled upon two priests and a fellow nun in “a compromising situation.”
• Father Thomas M Kottoor strangled Abhaya, while Sister Sephy attacked her with an axe. 
• And Father Jose Poothrikkayil—with the help of the other two—threw her into the well. There is some evidence that she may have been still alive.
• They (or those close to them) also tampered with and destroyed evidence—including her diary and clothes. 

The investigation

The timeline of the investigation into Sister Abhaya’s death is so bizarre that it reads like fiction:

• The first CBI investigation kicked off in 1993. It concluded in 1996 that the cause of death—murder or suicide—could not be determined due to the fuzzy medical evidence. The court rejected the report and ordered a fresh investigation.
• The second final report filed in 1999 confirmed that it was murder, but could not identify the killers. This too was rejected.
• And then in 2005, the CBI stated that “further investigation conducted, at the behest of the court, has not indicated involvement of any person in the death of Sister Abhaya” and a request was made that the “case be treated as closed as untraced.”
• The court rejected this report, as well, and ordered the case be transferred to the Kerala unit of the CBI in 2008.
• This investigation finally yielded the murder theory and led to the arrests of the three suspects. 
• But the trial only began last year, and the verdict was delivered yesterday.

An unholy mess

At every turn, the investigation was hampered by political pressure, the Church’s silence and internal rivalry. 

Internal CBI politics: kicked in at the very start when the agency first took over the case. In December 1993, the investigating officer submitted his resignation and called a press conference. He claimed he was being forced by his superior officer to determine Abhaya’s death was a case of suicide despite evidence of murder.

Tainted evidence: 

• First, the CBI accused the Kerala Superintendent of Police who conducted the initial investigation of destroying key evidence. 
• In 2008, another policeman who prepared the first inquest report killed himself due to CBI pressure. 
• There was talk that the vaginal swabs taken from Abhaya had been tampered with. 
• In 2007, the court ordered narco-analysis tests on the three suspects. Soon after the CBI claimed these had proved a dead end, there were allegations that the results had been doctored.

Obstruction from the Church: From the very start, it was eager to throw its weight behind the suicide theory—and champion the cause of the accused priests. When Abhaya’s death surfaced serious allegations that several priests were regular visitors to the convent, the Church simply brushed them aside. It instead leaned on the state Congress party to make the matter disappear. 

The verdict

The ruling: Father Thomas and Sister Sephy have been found guilty of murder and destruction of evidence. Father Jose had been let free due to lack of evidence several years ago. The sentences will be decided today.

The winning case: After 28 years, there wasn’t a lot of hard evidence left to convict anyone. Apart from the destroyed evidence, eight of the 49 prosecution witnesses turned hostile—and they were key to making the case for murder. In the end, the court relied on circumstantial evidence: 

“The most crucial evidence relied upon by the CBI had been the disturbance in the kitchen. The water bottle had fallen down near the fridge with dripping water, the veil was found underneath the exit door, which was found locked from the outside — the latches inside were unlatched — an axe and a basket had fallen down, two slippers of Abhaya were found at different places in the kitchen, and altogether, the area exhibited an appearance of having had a tussle inside. But, there was no blood on the scene.”

Also critical: the testimony of a former thief—who had broken into the convent in the early hours and seen the two priests:

“When the trial began in August 2019, on the third day, [Adakka] Raju told the court that the Crime Branch had pressured him to ‘confess to the crime that he never committed’. According to his statement during the trial, the Crime Branch officials had asked him to admit to committing the murder and that his family would receive Rs 2 lakh if he made the admission.”

The bottomline: This 28-year ordeal is best summed by Frontline: 

“It will be an unhappy end to such a baffling murder mystery if innocents are punished or culprits get away scot-free for want of evidence. Was Abhaya murdered or did she commit suicide? Whatever may be the final verdict, the question is likely to remain a blot on Kerala's Catholic Church, the State Police and the CBI for a long time to come.”

Reading list

The Indian Express offers a good overview. The News Minute has more on both the witnesses who turned hostile, and those who proved key to the conviction. The best read: The 2009 Frontline piece that captures the big picture of nasty decades-long mess.