Postal bombs for murder: The 1948 case that shocked Sri Lanka

At the core of this highly intriguing murder case was a paedophile’s infatuation for a schoolboy. It was mixed with unreasonable expectations bordering madness, rolled up in hatred and ingenious planning to murder the boy he failed to get for keeps.

Although he was not an expert tailor, Lenaduwa Lokuge Jayawardene (LLJ), the accused in this case, had opened a tailoring business. He got hold of a rickety sewing machine, and then bought a new one on hire-purchase. He then transferred the parts from the new machine to the old one and vice versa and defaulted on payment. The hire-purchase company seized the machine. In the end, LLJ acquired a new machine for nothing.

LLJ next hired expert tailors to work in his establishment which he named “Jayasiri Tailoring Mart” (JTM). Soon shirts and shorts made at JTM became a fad and befriended the boys who visited the shop. He also acquired a motorcycle and often took the boys for ‘rides.’ Many of these boys consented to ‘unnatural offence’ by LLJ who showered them with gifts.

S.M. Samarasinghe, born on Nov 11, 1930, was the youngest in a family of four children. His father was a cultivator, and the elder children were fairly well educated and well to do. The elder siblings took care of Samarasinghe’ education and admitted him to Dharmarajah College, a leading school in Kandy.

Although the elder siblings wanted to give him the best, they did not have sufficient means to board him in the college hostel. Therefore, they had to settle for places they could afford. One such place was LLJ’s ‘Jayasiri Tailoring Mart’. A friendly relationship was developed by LLJ towards the 14-year-old boy whom he showered with gifts. Thereafter, LLJ started to forcibly commit ‘unnatural offence’ on him. The boy loathed it and wanted to find a boarding elsewhere. The boy contacted a family friend, Kodikara, who found him lodging in the house of Alwis Appuhamy, the owner of Fancy Stores in Kandy.

LLJ kept bothering Kodikara and Alwis Appuhamy to send the boy back to him. His reason that the boy, due to his pleasant appearance, was a good omen for his business was a canny subterfuge for his paedophilia.

When his entreaties failed, he threatened to kill the boy if he did not come back to him. This prompted the boy’s elder brother, Podi Nilame, to arrange with one Jayasinghe, the Assistant Manager of the Tarzan Office in Kadugannawa, for the boy to stay in his office, and on March 3, 1947, the boy left Alwis Appuhamy’s house.

A few days later, LLJ visited Jayasinghe’s house and demanded that the boy be sent back to him. On March 27, LLJ had met the boy on the road and assaulted him. On a complaint to the police, a case was filed in courts under the Vagrants Ordinance against LLJ. However, he persuaded Podi Nilame to have the case withdrawn, but to no avail. The case was taken up on August 14 and LLJ was convicted and fined Rs. 5. With that, the infatuation LLJ had for the boy turned into hatred.

LLJ started to make threats which were not taken seriously at the start. But the threats became persistent. LLJ had confided in his close friend, K.T. Simon, that he would send parcel bombs to the boy and his siblings. This put Simon on the alert and he sent out warnings to the boy and his siblings.

On January 20, 1948, LLJ handed in two parcels at the Havelock Town post office. One had been addressed to the boy at Kadugannawa and the other to his sister,

LLJ started to make threats which were not taken seriously at the start. But the threats became persistent. LLJ had confided in his close friend, K.T. Simon, that he would send parcel bombs to the boy and his siblings.

Mrs. Seneviratne at Nelundeniya. On both parcels the sender’s name was written as A.M. Seneviratne of the Training College, Colombo. This again was his ingenuity, as the sender’s name being A.M. Seneviratne, the husband of one of the siblings, the recipients would drop their guard. On the same day. LLJ handed in two other parcels at the General Post Office, Colombo. One was addressed to Podi Nilame Samarakoon, the boy’s brother, and the other to Miss Dissanayake, the boy’s girlfriend.

On the morning of January 21, the boy left for school and in his absence the parcel was delivered at the bus office. The other three also received their parcels. When Podi Nilame received his parcel, his suspicions were aroused and anticipating that his brother, the boy Samarasinghe, might also have received one, he set out to Kadugannawa to warn the boy. When he arrived at Kadugannawa, it was too late; the boy had already been blown up.

There was also evidence that two stylishly-dressed men came by bus from Kegalle and left two bombs in a Bulathkohupitiya boutique run by Dingiri Banda (DB) and Punchi Banda and vanished. These bombs were identical to the parcel bombs sent to the family members of the deceased boy. DB and PB were over-holding tenants of the deceased boy’s family and there was ill-feeling owing to litigation. The master plan of the accused was to implicate them in the manufacturing and sending of all the bombs, and in fact that was the defence that was presented.

The case depended entirely on circumstantial evidence and the trial lasted eight days. The jury retired at 10.51 a.m. and returned at 11.51 a.m. They unanimously agreed on the verdict that the accused was guilty.

It is to the credit of the police to have meticulously tied up the circumstantial evidence in this case and brought to book this diabolical and crafty social parasite.

This would well have been the perfect crime if not for providence that led the accused to blurt out his plans to his closest friend Simon who warned the victims and also bore testimony at the trial doing his civic duty.

On May 9, 1949, when large crowds had gathered at the Audience Hall of the Supreme Court and outside, Trial Judge F.R. Dias passed the death sentence on the accused.

The convict appealed to the Privy Council, but the petition was dismissed.