AP News, December 14th, 2006
A Sri Lankan court convicted two men and sentenced them to death for killing a woman who survived the first waves of the 2004 tsunami but then was pushed back into the sea by the pair after they snatched her gold necklace, a police officer said Thursday.
The incident first came to attention when Colombo's Daily Mirror newspaper splashed photographs of the two men yanking the chain from Dineti Deshika's neck after the first wave of the Dec. 26, 2004 tsunami struck and then fighting each other for the jewelry. After stealing the necklace, they let the woman fall back into the torrent and her body was found after the waters receded.
After the publication of the photos, police tracked down Ruwan Mapalagamage and Ajith Kumara on Jan. 13, 2005. Both are residents of the southern port city of Galle.
The incident was widely publicized and condemned in Sri Lanka, where the tsunami killed at least 35,000 people and affected about 1 million.
"The honorable judge found both of them guilty of murder and sentenced then to death," said police office Jayalath Ballagale from Galle. The verdict came on Wednesday and was based on a video and witnesses testimony.
Galle High Court Judge Chandrasena Rajapakse sentenced Mapalagamage to two years imprisonment and fined him $250 for gold theft and sentenced him to death for murder. Kumara was acquitted of theft but sentenced for murder.
Though the pair has been sentenced to death, Sri Lanka has not executed anyone in three decades despite lifting a 1976 moratorium on the death penalty in December 2004.
Days after the tsunami, police arrested dozens of people for looting, some making off in trucks carrying refrigerators, washing machines and furniture from coastal homes and hotels.
