Kochi: The Kerala High Court on Thursday called for the records in connection with the conviction and death sentence given to a 24-year-old woman for the sensational murder of her boyfriend in 2022.

A bench of Justices P B Suresh Kumar and Jobin Sebastian asked the state to indicate its stand on the appeal moved by the woman, Greeshma and her uncle, challenging their conviction and punishment.

They have also sought suspension of their sentence during the pendency of the appeal.

The High Court suspended the sentence of the uncle, Nirmala Kumaran Nair who was given a three-year jail term for destruction of evidence and is at present out on bail.

The Neyyattinkara Additional District Sessions Court had on January 20 sentenced Greeshma to death for the murder of her boyfriend Sharon Raj, saying that the manner of the killing was “extremely brutal, gruesome, diabolical and revolting”, shocking the collective conscience of the community.

In the joint appeal, Greeshma has argued that the sessions court’s judgment and sentence were “against facts, evidence, and law” and that it “committed a grave error in appreciation of the evidence”.

She has claimed that the Neyyattinkara sessions court did not have the jurisdiction to try her as the crime occurred within the jurisdiction of Palukal police station in Tamil Nadu.

She has also claimed in her plea that the court “went wrong in finding that the accused (Greeshma) enticed the deceased (Raj)”.

“It was in evidence that the deceased came to the house of the accused on his own choice and not on account of any enticement and therefore finding of the court that the accused had enticed the deceased by using deceitful means is without any evidence,” her plea said.

She has also contended that right from the start of the investigation, the entire case assumed sensation, and “there was a clear vilification campaign” against her and hence there was reason to hold that the court was “pressurised to a certain extent to find the accused guilty and sentence her to death”. “The accused did not get a fair trial,” the plea claimed.

It has also claimed that there was no scientific evidence on record to prove that the deceased died due to poisoning.

According to the prosecution, Raj was lured by Greeshma to her house in Ramavarmanchirai, located in Tamil Nadu’s Kanyakumari district, on October 14, 2022, and was poisoned with an ayurvedic tonic laced with paraquat, a herbicide.

Raj, 23, succumbed to multiple organ failure at a hospital on October 25, 2022.

The prosecution had told the court that Greeshma, then 22, plotted the murder after Raj refused to end their relationship, even though her marriage had been arranged with an army man from Nagercoil.