Bhubaneswar, July 29: The defence in the Graham Staines triple murder case today pointed out discrepancies in investigation and claimed that most witnesses did not name Dara Singh as being the chief perpetrator of the crime. Continuing his argument for the second day, defence counsel Bana Mohanty said the first investigating officer of the sensational case, J K Mohapatra, did not mention the names of the suspects on the reverse of the dead body challan he submitted on January 23, 1999.

Mohapatra also mentioned the vehicle in which the Australian missionary and his two sons were burnt in as a car though it was a station wagon, the counsel told the court of the district and sessions judge, Khurda, M N Patnaik.

He said though Mohapatra had examined 13 witnesses, none had spoken about Dara except Purna Mahanta, who had claimed that he had told him before the incident about Christian missionaries coming to Manoharpur. The crime branch investigating officer S C Bala had examined over 100 witnesses of whom only four had talked about Dara's involvement. But subsequently, three of them, as prosecution witnesses, had turned hostile, he added.

Bureau Report