Indian student in Sweden sentenced to 11 years in jail
(Lead)
By Alfred de Tavares
Gothenburg, July 25 (IANS) Venkateshwar Reddy Pullagurla, the 25-year-old
Indian student in Sweden, was Wednesday sentenced to 11 years in jail
followed by deportation and a lifetime ban on entering this country, for the
rape and wilful murder of a fellow student with whom he was in love.
Passing a written sentence, Justice Staffan Ridholm of the Swedish High
Court declared: "Pullagurla has shown greatest ruthlessness and cruelty by
holding tightly shut Jelena Ivanesivic's mouth and nose under an
inordinately long period of time, causing her death through strangulation."
Ivanesivic's stark naked and handcuffed body was found in the cellar-toilet
of a palatial mansion in Langedrag, the exclusive residential area of the
Swedish west coast town of Gothenburg, April 13. She had lain there dead
since Easter Sunday, April 8.
Pullagurla was accused on three counts. The first count was drugging and
raping a 20-year-old girl (name not disclosed according to Swedish law) on
the night of Jan 28, 2006, at the King's Head restaurant in Gothenburg where
he worked, for which he has been found guilty and will serve a term in
prison concurrently with the term for murder.
The second count was the attempted rape of more than one teenage girl, after
intoxicating and drugging them at the Moulin Rouge nightclub here on the
night of March 3-4, 2006, for which he has been acquitted.
The third count was of the premeditated murder of Ivanesivic, 20, under
unduly violent circumstances.
While studying at a university, Jelena worked as an au pair girl for the
Thomas and Therese Dahls and lived in their villa where her body was found.
Although the prosecution had demanded a life sentence, the judge explained
his leniency in his written statement: "While the brutality of the heinous
crime is unquestionable this court finds that the violence used, despite her
helpless condition that did not permit her to defend herself, is not of such
degree that her sufferings merit her killer a lifetime imprisonment."
Ragunath Mishra, first secretary (consular) at the Embassy of India in
Stockholm, told IANS after the sentence was passed: "It is a terrible deed.
The judge has indeed been very generous. We had feared worse."
According to his statement to police and psychiatric examiners, Pullagurla
was born May 23, 1982 in Ghanapur, a village near Siddipet town in Andra
Pradesh.
He described himself as the only son of hardworking parents. He completed
his B.Sc. in microbiology at the University of Hyderabad in 2003 and then
worked in the IT industry.
"I came to Sweden in January 2005 to study molecular biology at the
Institute of Technology in Skovde. However, I did not thrive there and left
the institute in April 2005 without taking any examinations. I moved to
Gothenburg in search of work," he said in his statement.
In the autumn term of September 2006, Pullagurla enrolled himself at the
University of Gothenburg in a course entitled Scandinavian Studies.
"Within a few days at the university I met this lovely, lively girl, Jelena
Ivanesivic from Croatia. We fell in love immediately and intensely. We met
often, mostly at my place or in a cafe and we took long walks through the
city. She visited me, at home, nearly everyday, but I visited her just once,
at her invitation, on that fatal day that has so completely destroyed my
life."
The investigating police officer, Inspector Ingemar Mansson of the
Gothenburg police department said: "Pullagurla does not figure in the Social
Registret (the Swedish national criminal record) except that he has a
standing unpaid debt. He has neither alcohol nor drug problems but confesses
to suffering intense psychic stress, especially a very deep sense of guilt
towards his parents."
He added: "Pullagurla's lapses of memory are highly peculiar. He claims
having lived since January 2007 until the day he was arrested and detained,
somewhere in Hagen in Gothenburg, with a family from whom he rented a room
but cannot remember at which address."
Indo-Asian News Service
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