Australian tourist acted strangely, muder accused tell court
October 13th, 2008 - 11:45 pm ICT by IANS -Panaji, Oct 13 (IANS) The three pub staffers accused in last week’s murder of 65-year-old John Kelly have claimed that the Australian tourist’s behaviour was very unpredictable on the fateful morning he died. In their respective bail applications filed before a trial court in Goa, the three accused - Jagat Pradhan, Manab Basak and Jaykrishna Das - claimed in unison that Kelly’s behaviour on the day he died, Oct 8, was very unusual.
“He placed a knife on the stomach of one of the kitchen staff. He then laughed and said ‘Sorry mate, relax’,” claim the trio in their applications, adding that Kelly had then ordered a round of beers for the bar’s guests and placed a Rs.500 note on the table.
“When the guests refused the drinks, the foreigner suddenly became aggressive and pointed the knife at my neck and held my hair at the same time,” the bail application adds.
The bail application also refutes the police theory that no knife was involved in the scuffle that ended with Kelly receiving internal injuries, which in turn led to his death.
“The foreigner was in a highly drunken state and was brandishing a knife,” the application claims, adding that the police were strangely silent on the issue.
The application also claims that Kelly, after leaving the Calangute bar following the scuffle had in fact returned in a police jeep to search for his wallet. According to the police version officially relayed to the media on Oct 9, Deputy Superintendent of Police Gundu Naik had claimed that the police had learnt about Kelly only when he was admitted to the Goa Medical College located near Panaji, where the Australian later died.
John Kelly’s death last week had the Goa Police in a tizzy, after the foreigner died several hours after suffering intern injuries in a scuffle with employees of Club City bar and restaurant on the morning of Oct 8.
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October 14th, 2008 at 9:41 am
Series of events prior to the unfortunate death of Mr. John Kelly; an Australian citizen on holiday/ temporarily residing in Goa prior to his death as per eyewitnesses of the incident.
Signed report by over 23 eyewitnesses available at the premise & submitted to the authorities.
Mr. Kelly was first spotted arriving at our licensed round the clock restaurant & bar at around 0800 hours on 8th, October; 2008; in a condition which can be best described as not in full control of his senses; which could be due to a wrong frame of mind/ disturbed/ depressed/ intoxicated due to substance abuse or any other reason which would be obvious to either those who knew him well or otherwise be medically/ otherwise investigated. He had his shirt buttons completely open & carried a couldn’t careless attitude towards others in general which is derived from the fact that he was not appropriately dressed & started impromptu conversations with anyone & everyone who was in his path/ vicinity. On arriving at a table of his choice, he immediately started a conversation with a group of people seated across who probably misunderstood his probing & intrusive conversation as mere friendliness n’ responded back in a cordial manner. He immediately called out to a waiter & ordered a round of drinks for them. He was loud, abusive, racially discriminating in his speech which was aimed at everyone in his vision which seemed like signs of a totally intoxicated person with not much bearing of his surroundings. On witnessing this, the others decided not to accept any drinks on his behalf & thus directed the waiter not to serve them any such drinks on his behalf. Most people preferred to stay out of his path as he seemed to be having some kind of mood swings as he oscillated frequently between friendly conversation & uncalled aggression in the form of physical movement, aimless murmuring, loud outbursts n’ targeted aggression including moving around the entire premise & stopping short of individuals who had no choice but to hear him out & wait it out till such time as he would move to the next target. In one such move he bumped into one of the cooks & pointed a knife (a foldable large knife) which he was carrying with him. He pointed the knife at the cook’s stomach while being unable to keep himself steady. The cook had no choice but to hold his ground & pray that he doesn’t strike. He suddenly apologised to the cook for his behaviour & moved back towards his table. This is when he shouted & abused at the waiter & summoned him regarding the drinks ordered for his neighbouring table. He abused at him left right n’ centre & the one sided conversation can be best described as outright provocation in the form of direct & indirect verbal abuse, racial discrimination n’ insult to everything that the individual stands for including his national pride. This is when the waiter who was not very articulate tried to match him for his words; to which Mr. Kelly responded by holding the waiter by his head & putting the knife to his throat & slowly exerting pressure. The waiter moved his head down to the table with the pressure of the knife & heard out another round of verbal abuse. Once Mr. Kelly had prolonged the situation to his full satisfaction he loosened a bit & temporarily the knife lost contact with the waiter’s throat. This was when the waiter found his opportunity to free himself from his grip & nudged him in the face. Seeing the chaos, the manager who was so far pleading to Mr. Kelly to let go of the waiter also got into the scuffle & simultaneously the Security guard got in too. In the scuffle that followed they managed to free the knife out of his hand, pushed & nudged him away. It seems that he tripped over one of the seats made of marble & landed near two other marble seats & a speaker in a tight corner where his ribs probably came in the direct path of the fall. As he was completely intoxicated & did not have control over his physical sense his reflexes probably did not allow him to break the fall; which meant that the direct impact would have come on to his ribs while landing. This is when the boys backed out & he got up & looked for his wallet. One of the boys found the wallet & handed it back to him. He then abused & shouted again & walked out of the premise. The manager rightly called up the Calangute police station from his mobile as it had been a major incident. After a very short while, the police turned up with Mr. Kelly along; whom they may have found walking along the road & heard out the details. They asked Mr. Kelly his version but Mr. Kelly by this time probably gauged how wrong he was through this incident & so decided to hush up the matter & just slip away the moment the police probed him about the knife. The police realized that Mr. Kelly was in the wrong & that none of the parties would probably be interested in taking this any further; told the boys to be available around the premise in case they were required while they look for him. We do not know what happened after this till such time as the police came back to us in the evening to round up all the boys involved in this incident as the news was that Mr. Kelly had died. We would not like to speak about any specifics which are under investigation & would thus not like to debate right from wrong at this stage but have already started the process of introspection so as to ensure that even though a repetition of such an incident seems very remote as most people would never land themselves into such a situation; we would still like to leave no stone unturned in contemplating how this could have been avoided. At such a moment our heart goes out firstly to the near & dear ones of Mr. Kelly who would feel completely shattered & to the boys who have got stuck into this situation which seems to be forced onto them & all our colleagues at our place of work who have had to go through the direct & indirect consequences of the incident.
In the end we would like to say that we come from a country that believes in the ideals of the Mahatmas who taught us to offer the other cheek if someone was to strike us at one but are sure that even they would have advised to react differently if someone was to keep a knife on ones throat & be fully capable of using it. We would also like to state that our bar at Club City is referred to as the ‘Boomerang Bar’ which effectively suggests our soft corner & affection towards the Australian way of life, ethos n’ the people in general & would continue to welcome our friends from Australia & other parts of the world to our land of plenty where we look forward to provide the safest possible environment to one and all as unity in diversity is not just a phrase for us but actually a way of life in India; a country with over a billion people from all walks of life imaginable.