Court rejects Yoshitha Rajapaksa’s appeal in money laundering case
COLOMBO ‒ The Court of Appeal on Friday (2) dismissed an appeal filed by Yoshitha Rajapaksa, the son of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa, seeking to prevent prosecutors from proceeding with a conspiracy charge in an ongoing money laundering case before the Colombo High Court.
The judgment was delivered by a bench comprising Justices Amal Ranaraja and Dr Sumudu Premachandra, with the court ruling that there is no legal impediment to prosecuting the conspiracy charge against Rajapaksa.
Delivering the ruling, Justice Ranaraja said the appellant had argued that the conspiracy charge could not be maintained after the second accused in the case was discharged from the proceedings.
The Court of Appeal rejected that argument, holding that Sri Lankan law does not require all alleged co-conspirators to be before the court for a conspiracy charge to proceed.
The bench ruled that a conspiracy indictment may lawfully continue against a single accused even if another alleged conspirator is not a party to the proceedings, and found that the Colombo High Court had correctly allowed the charge to proceed.
Accordingly, the court dismissed Rajapaksa’s appeal.
The case stems from indictments filed by the Attorney General under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act against Yoshitha Rajapaksa and his grandmother, Daisy Forrest.
The latter was subsequently discharged from the case after medical evidence established that she was unfit to stand trial.
Following her discharge, Rajapaksa’s legal team raised a preliminary objection before the High Court, arguing that the conspiracy count could not be maintained against him alone. After the High Court rejected that objection, he sought leave to appeal before the Court of Appeal.
-ENCL
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