The State vs Kalapuge Don Chamindaka Ravi Gunawardena – CA HCC/0366/2017-2022

In the case between The Hon. Attorney General and Kalapuge Don Chamindaka Ravi Gunawardena, the court addressed the issue of whether the Appellant was guilty of murder under Section 296 of the Penal Code based on circumstantial evidence. The court held that the conviction for murder should be affirmed, determining that the evidence—consisting of witness accounts, forensic analysis, and the circumstances of the victim’s death—sufficiently established the Appellant’s guilt beyond reasonable doubt. The principle that circumstantial evidence, when forming an unbroken chain leading to the only inference of guilt, can suffice for conviction was reaffirmed. Reliance was placed on statutory provisions of the Penal Code and established judicial precedents, underlining the sufficiency of comprehensi