Fr Job Mathew, one of the three priests of Kerala’s Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church who have been charged with raping a young woman by blackmailing her using her confession secret, was arrested on Thursday reportedly soon after he surrendered to the police.
The arrest came within 24 hours of the Kerala High Court rejecting the anticipatory bail applications of the three accused priests observing that they had hunted the victim like predators. The anticipatory bail application of another priest accused in the same case is pending before the court.
Following Fr Job Mathew’s arrest, the police’s Crime Branch probing the case intensified its search for the other three accused priests — including the two who were denied bail on Wednesday. They had gone into hiding immediately after the case was registered over the scandal.
Fr Job Mathew, the second accused in the case, had allegedly exploited the woman sexually several times by blackmailing her using her confession secret, surrendered at the office of the Dy SP (Crime Branch) in Kollam early Thursday morning. In her confession heard by him, the woman had told him about how another priest had abused her before her marriage.
The priest surrendered before the police on Thursday as the Crime Branch had been carrying out extensive searches for the four accused including him, particularly after High Court denied bail to three of them observing that the investigators could go ahead with the legal procedures including arrest.
After preliminary questioning, the Crime Branch recorded his arrest and subjected him to medical examination. The Crime Branch would now approach the court for getting him in their custody for further investigations. There were also reports that the priest was taken into custody from the house of one of his relatives.
As reports came out that the other three accused priests — Fr Abraham Varghese alias Sony Varghese, Fr Johnson V Mathew and Fr Jaise K George, first, third and fourth accused respectively — were not willing to surrender, the Crime Branch extended their search to Bangalore and Salem where they are said to have relatives and friends.
According to sources, the first accused and the third accused may move the Supreme Court for anticipatory bail but the investigators are planning to nab them before that. These priests are currently in hiding.
The sex scandal rocking the Orthodox Church erupted last month after an audio clip containing a purported conversation between the woman’s husband and a Church official in which the former alleged sexual abuse of his wife by the priests came out through social media. He said five priests had sexually abused his wife by blackmailing her with her confession secret.
According to the woman’s statements to the Crime Branch and before a Magistrate, Fr Abraham Varghese, who was a neighbour, had in 1999 sexually abused her when she was only 16 and was not married by promising to marry her. He continued to exploit her till he married another woman in 2002. The priest allegedly resumed abusing her in 2005 by threatening to disclose their relationship.