Shaibin Ashraf, who was sentenced to 13 years rigorous imprisonment for the murder of Mysuru-based traditional healer Shaba Sherif, had riches worth Rs 300 crore and a ruthlessness which drew parallel to the methods of torture employed in Nazi concentration camps, according to the statements and conclusions cited in the order issued by the Thushar M, Additional District & Sessions Judge-I, Manjeri.

Enchained in a bathroom for more than a year, Sherif was brutally tortured to give away the secret formula for the treatment of piles. Shaibin beat him and spayed sanitiser on his face. A kick by Shaibin in the chest caused him to fall back, and his head dashed against the wall. He died, but not before he was put through hell for days.

A video obtained by police showed that the walls of the room where Sherif was confined were painted in black colour. The Special Public Prosecutor (SPP) pointed out that the black paint was for a special purpose. He broached studies regarding coercive methods of stress manipulations used to torture prisoners of war, especially after the Second World War and Nazi-sponsored concentration camps. The SPP also quoted 'Biderman's chart of coercion', a tool designed to explain coercive techniques used by perpetrators of domestic abuse to paint the gory ways of prolonged torture meted out to Sherif in a cramped space.

While narrating that Sherif was confined in a small, dark-painted room with limited movements due to him being chained to the wall, the SPP said that it was one of the cruel methods as per the chart of coercion employed by Shaibin to extract information regarding the ingredients for treatment of piles. Sherif slept on a small platform in the bathroom, according to the deposition of prosecution witness 1.

Shaibin made sure that the crime scene was clean as a slate after the body was chopped and disposed. Black paint was scraped away from the walls. The ceiling was coated with white cement,however there were spots where the black paint was visible. The court observed that Shaibin was immensely wealthy with assets more than 300 crore and that he had the capacity to obtain the best brains available to cause disappearance of evidence.

The accused's counsel had clung to the contention that 'corpus delicti' (proof of crime) had not been found, suggesting the absence of Sherif's body. According to them, the prosecution failed to provide evidence to show that Sherif was dead, and there was no medical evidence of death. The court, however, observed that if corpus delicti is a must to prove the guilt of the accused, it will be giving immunity to accused persons who will erase all traces of the victim’s body. "The accused who are capable and equipped with modern technology can easily escape from punishment if they destroy the corpus without any trace," the order noted.

Shaibin planned the death and disposal of the body in a way the court called 'highly professional'. All the odds were against the police. There was no body, crime came to light after two years. Evidence was nearly wiped clean. The golden hour of investigation, which is immediately after the crime, was not available to the investigation agency. "This is a classic example of organised crime, which is very difficult to detect and prove since the persons committing it make use of all modern scientific knowledge, which the investigation agency finds it difficult to match," the judge said in the order.

The case hung by a hair strand, which eventually helped police crack the case. Hair strands were collected from the toilet outlet pipe of the bathroom where Sherif was tortured and from inside a piece of pipe found in a waste heap. Besides, 30 hair strands were obtained from the Honda City car, which was used to transport chopped remains of the body.

DNA sequence obtained from a hair strand in the car matched with that of the blood sample of Allah Bakash, brother of Shaba Sherif and Ismayil, biological sister’s son of Sherif. This proved that the source of the hair strand and DNA of Allah Bakash belonged to the same maternal lineage. Mitochondrial DNA analysis is sufficient to show that the body of Shaba Shareef was transferred in the car for disposal, the court observed.