The Home Department has issued sanction to the State Police Chief to seek Mutual Legal Assistance from the US as part of a probe into cases related to the streaming of obscene videos during Google Meet at Alappuzha District Court and Alappuzha Additional District Court - 1.
Mutual Legal Assistance is a mechanism whereby countries cooperate with one another in order to provide and obtain formal assistance in prevention, suppression, investigation and prosecution of crime to ensure that the criminals do not escape or sabotage the due process of law for want of evidence available in different countries, according to the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA).
The MHA is the nodal Ministry and the Central authority for seeking and providing mutual legal assistance in criminal law matters. The MHA receives all such requests, examines them and takes appropriate action. Alappuzha Cyber Crime police filed two cases in 2023 after obscene videos were streamed during Google Meet in two courts on the same day.
The DGP earlier filed a request to the Government to accord sanction to submit Mutual Legal Assistance from the US as part of the probe. The Government has issued sanctions to send requests for legal assistance to the MHA through the online portal to get the required information from the competent authorities of Google in the US for further investigation in the case. The Inspector General, Crime Branch ( State Interpol Liaison officer) will take the steps to make the legal assistance request.