Sarath Kumarasiri Rathnayake v. Hon. Attorney General – CA PHC APN/131/2016-2017

In Sarath Kumarasiri Rathnayake v. Hon. Attorney General, the court addressed whether the sentence imposed for the offence of rape of a minor under section 364(2)(e) of the Penal Code should be revised by the Court of Appeal, and if exceptional circumstances existed to justify suspending the remainder of the sentence under section 303 of the Code of Criminal Procedure Act. The application for suspension of sentence was dismissed on the basis that the grounds raised did not constitute exceptional circumstances and public interest warranted the sentence’s enforcement. The decision reaffirmed the principle that individual circumstances, legal advice, or sentence bargaining do not override judicial sentencing discretion in serious offences, relying on statutory provisions which restrict appell