News
Yala incident: Court orders Police to track down 2 more vehicles
View(s):The Tissamaharama Magistrate Courts has ordered the Police to track down two more vehicles involved in the Yala off track driving incident in violation of park regulations.
The two vehicles are reported to be from Vavuniya and Kalutara. The order was given after the court took up the case against 32 vehicles which reportedly entered the park and drove off track.
So far ten suspects including V. K. D. Nuwan Amaraweera (29), Agriculture, Wildlife and Forest Resources Conservation Minister Mahinda Amaraweera’s brother’s son, had been arrested and released on bail.
However action has been filed only in respect of eight vehicles as there was evidence only against those vehicles so far according to the investigations.
A decision on the six vehicles which have been detained earlier would be taken up at the next hearing of the case Tuesday, December 13.
Another vehicle which was detained earlier was released on Friday as the investigations revealed the vehicle was not involved in off track driving.
The court had also acknowledged it had received four reports on the investigation. The court during the previous hearing had called for reports on the mechanical engineering situation of vehicles detained: A detailed list of the 32 vehicles that entered the park, an environmental damage assessment by six experts from the Ruhunu University and a report from the Government analyst on the video evidence.
Yala Park Warden Manoj Vidyaratne said the Government analyst report was called to check whether the video posted by the people who drove vehicles off the road was edited.
He said even though 13 vehicles reached the area of the park where the incident took place, only eight vehicles had breached park laws and had driven off track according to the investigations carried out so far.
He said he told the court two more vehicles needed to be taken into custody as the investigations revealed they too were involved in off track driving. There were no casualties.
President’s Counsel Maithri Gunaratne appeared on behalf of three registered vehicle owners, while President’s Counsel Upali Mohotti appeared on behalf of another three registered vehicle owners.
President Counsel Upali Mohotti had requested the release of the six vehicles detained. The Wildlife Investigative Officer and the Park Warden did not object to the request.
The court said a decision on the six vehicles detained earlier would be taken up at the next hearing.
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