The controversial hanging of D.J. Siripala alias Maru Sira

Maru Sira being taken into custody

By Chandani Kirinde

Judicial executions are controversial whenever they take place and Sri Lanka is no exception to the rule. One case that attracted wide public attention was the hanging of D.J. Siripala alias Maru Sira which resulted in the appointment of a presidential commission of inquiry over allegations that the man was already dead by the time he was taken to the gallows and hanged.

Retired Commissioner of Prisons H.G. Dharmadasa, as the officer officiating the execution, knows more about the events of the day in early August 1975, when the notorious criminal was hanged.

Siripala was a notorious criminal operating in the Anuradhapura area, engaged in bootlegging and extortion and was tried in absentia for a murder and convicted. He was subsequently arrested and, having exhausted all avenues of appeal, was marked for execution. Siripala was in his mid-20s at the time. 

It is an execution that the former Prison Commissioner remembers well more than four decades later. “I was to go on a scholarship to UK for my Post Graduate studies and the hanging took place a week earlier.”

As was the rule, Dharmadasa who was the Prison Superintendent at the time visited the prisoner the night before the execution. “I went to see him around 12 midnight in the cell. He spoke to me and seemed alright. I left a little later and made a gate book entry about what transpired and left the building.”

Dharmadasa had arrived earlier than usual around 7 o’clock next morning with the unsettling feeling which he experiences on the day that such an order has to be carried out. The hanging was to take place at 8 a.m., as is always the case so as to enable the condemned man to have his breakfast and be readied for the execution. 

When he arrived, Dharmadasa was informed by the two officers on duty that the prisoner was not waking up. Siripala was a known troublemaker in prison and had attempted to escape once and it was assumed that he was deliberately not getting up to escape death by hanging.

“I sent the two officers and told them to handcuff him and bring him but they returned saying that Siripala was still asleep. Time was running out and the hanging had to be carried out at the exact time. It was not possible to call the President’s Office at the time to explain the ensuing problem. I called the Prison Medical Officer and he examined the prisoner and said he was malingering meaning he was pretending to be sleeping or sick.

“Having taken a medical opinion, the prisoner was readied for the hanging and taken on a stretcher which was placed on the trapdoor. As the prisoner was unable to stand straight, it fell on the executioner to lift Siripala who was in a dazed condition, pull the noose down and place it around the prisoner’s neck and hit the lever. He was declared dead by the Medical Officer shortly afterwards but it was not the end of the story.”

Under Prison Rules, prisoners condemned to death are allowed a visit by their next of kin the day before the execution under tight security. Siripala’s wife Ran Manika had visited him the previous night and had remained outside the prison gate till next morning. After the execution, someone from inside the prison had told her that her husband was dead before he was hanged. The woman had run through the Kandy town wailing the news she had heard and it was soon picked by the press which resulted in a Presidential Commission being appointed.

Dharmadasa had left the country for his studies in the UK by then and was not called to give evidence even though he wrote to the Commissioner of Prisons at the time J.P. Delgado saying he was willing to return for the purpose provided he be allowed to return to the UK to complete his studies. However, he was not called before the Commission.

Siripala’s body was exhumed for a fresh post-mortem and it then transpired that the man had in his stomach several tablets of Largactil which are given to prisoners to calm their nerves. The prisoner had surreptitiously collected these tablets over several days, kept them hidden and taken them hours before the execution.

The Commission recorded evidence from other prison officials and medical experts and conclude that Siripala’s execution did not fit into the definition of a ‘judicial hanging’ as there was no rapture of the spinal cord and said ‘prison authorities were responsible’ for carrying out the blotched execution. Given that the drop was short as the prisoner could not stand straight, death had been caused due to asphyxia. 

However, as the Commission report did not fix responsibility on any individual, Police concluded they could not proceed with an investigation and the matter ended there.

“When a person is sentenced to death in Sri Lanka, what is written is, ‘You will be hanged by your neck till you are dead.’ There is no legal requirement that the death has to always fit into the definition of what constitutes a ‘judicial hanging’ even though the procedure is followed in a way that the final outcome would be so,” Dharmadasa said.

Despite the questions raised about the judicial hangings after this incident, Dharmadasa believes the majority of Sri Lankans support the death penalty. “Society as a whole has no empathy for prisoners unless they are personally affected. For example, if your sister is raped by someone, you will demand that the culprit be hanged, but if your brother rapes someone else’s sister, you will have a different attitude. This is the mindset that needs to be changed. People are remanded at the drop of a hat and our prisons are full of people who should not be there,” Dharmadasa said.

As for Siripala, the story of his life and death was immortalised in two films titled ‘Siripala saha Ran Manika’ and ‘Maruwa Samage Wasey’ but minus the frills and romanticism of the celluloid world, judicial hangings are a traumatic experience for those who have to witness them.