The Colombo Fort Magistrate has decided to use Skype technology to record evidence from a witness in Italy regarding a theft of US$700 belonging to an Italian woman while she was staying at a hotel in Colombo.

Accordingly, Colombo Fort Magistrate ThilinaGamage directed police to make necessary arrangements to record evidence from the Italian woman using Skype technology on March 14 under the supervision of an independent observer attached to the University of Colombo School of Computing.

The Magistrate made this order following the prosecution’s submissions that the first witness of the case Francisca Dieda an Italian national was currently out of the country and she had informed her difficulties to return back to Sri Lanka.   

In her complaint to the Fort police in 2011, the Italian woman alleged that someone had stolen a sum of US$700 belonging to her from the hotel room where she accommodated.  Police arrested a hotel employee DhananjayaPrabhath of Ragama for allegedly involved in the theft. Police had told Court that the video footage obtained from the CCTV camera installed in the hotel had also revealed that the hotel employee had involved in the incident.

At a previous magisterial inquiry, the suspect informed Court that he was not pleading guilty for the charge when the charge sheet was read out by the interpreter mudliar.(Lakmal Sooriyagoda)