Original subtitles

This could have been any house in Kerala,

but what unfolded within its confines was something unheard of.

Today in Koodathayi, during the quiet hours of the morning,

while most in town were still sleeping,

Jolly Joseph, a respected local mother,

was taken into custody in a case

which has sent shockwaves through all of India.

Present at the time of her arrest was her son, Remo.

She was arrested early in the morning.

My brother and I were the only family members present at that time.

The police team suddenly showed up.

A police officer, uh...

A police officer named Jeevan

and two other female officers arrived to make the arrest.

They said they had come to take her away, that she was being taken into custody.

And we were in a state of shock.

I mean, we were completely stunned with what was happening.

We didn't know what to do.

Because until now, we had always been under the impression

that our family members have died because of natural causes.

And for a long time, we didn't believe

what they were saying about my mother.

And now, I'll never be able to accept this person as my mother again.

A shocking story is emerging out of Koodathayi,

a sleepy village in Kozhikode district of north Kerala.

Jolly Joseph has been arrested for allegedly

killing her mother-in-law, father-in-law,

husband, and three others over a period of 14 years

without raising anyone's suspicions.

In a first for Kerala police,

the mortal remains of the six victims

are being exhumed from their graves on the same day.

And the mastermind behind it all is a woman named Jolly Joseph.

Who was this person Jolly?

How was she able to commit six murders

without her family or neighbors suspecting anything?

Jolly, the prime accused in this case,

was a faculty at the National Institute of Technology.

As long as I know, uh, she had a good connection with the church also.

Many find it hard to believe that a woman,

known to be family-oriented,

well-respected, and liked,

could be a cold-blooded killer.

KARUNYA RESIDENCE ASSOCIATION K.G. SIMON IPS, KAIYYALAKYAGATTU

I am K.G. Simon, IPS.

Now retired.

I've devoted 37 years of my life

to working as a police officer.

I was the District Police Superintendent in Kollam back in 2019,

and then I was transferred to Kozhikode Rural District

as the Superintendent of Police.

During my time in Kozhikode,

a report from the Thamarassery DYSP was brought to me.

The report referred to the death of a person named

Roy Thomas of the Ponnamattam family.

He had died there in 2011.

The Ponnamattam family was a prominent family in Koodathayi.

The eldest son was Roy Thomas.

The report was based on a complaint filed by Roy's sister,

Renji and his younger brother, Rojo.

The report clearly stated that Roy's death was caused by cyanide poisoning.

But it didn't say where he got the cyanide from or how he consumed it,

nor did it mention any difficulties Roy might have had,

that led him to commit suicide.

After I read the report,

I decided to get involved in the Koodathayi case.

This marked the beginning of the investigation into Roy's death.

As for my first meeting with the accused Jolly Joseph,

it took place at the crime branch office.

It was only after she was arrested and taken into custody

that I actually started questioning her.

It was very difficult at first because she wouldn't say anything.

It was only after showing her all the evidence that she started to talk.

She confessed everything.

All I can say is we have been investigating this for two months.

We have questioned at least 200 people. And no one knew about this.

Our investigation and, uh...

uh, all the evidence points to the accused,

a woman named Jolly Joseph.

Further investigations are still on.

Is she cooperating with the police, sir?

Has she been cooperative so far?

To answer your questions, yes, she has been cooperative.

Confessions that are made in police custody,

cannot be taken at face value.

The person probably said things under duress

so we cannot accept it as the truth.

Therefore, it can never be used as evidence against the accused.

Whether the prosecution team uses it as evidence,

or the defense team uses it,

this kind of confession will have absolutely no validity in court.

But the crimes mentioned in the charge sheet did not really happen.

The most important thing Jolly said to me during our first interaction was,

"I did not commit this crime."

This story has absolutely exploded across India.

Kerala, a region known for its high levels of education and employment,

is now in the headlines for this bizarre tragedy.

Everything changed after the story broke.

Koodathayi was thronged by a lot of people, who were mere spectators.

Almost every day for a month,

reporters were camping outside the Ponnamattam home.

In fact, I am, uh, one such reporter, you know,

who actually camped out.

There were a lot of neighbors who were very upset about Jolly.

And there were contradicting takes on who she was.

Some would say that she was very, uh, good.

Others would say that,

"No, but she always had this dark side to her."

She was always friendly and cordial with everyone,

and, uh, she was a very kind person.

In fact, they never saw Jolly ill-treat anyone.

Jolly must have had some psychological problems.

Like some kind of mental disability.

Now, our sources suggest that she was, in fact, connected

to a sex racket.

I heard people making catcalls around that time,

saying that, you know, "Kattappana, Kattappana."

And, uh, she's "high range, high range," you know.

So I realized that

because of the place that she came from, Kattappana,

the fact that it was from the high ranges, uh, a hilly terrain...

All these things were actually posed as some sort of a bad thing against her.

I felt like most reports, uh, were trying to showcase

the most salacious aspects of the story.

No one seemed to be asking the most important questions.

Who was Jolly Joseph

and what made her do the things that she allegedly did?

And I think that was one of the reasons

why I felt that I should do a story about, uh, Jolly Joseph.

I'll go to, uh, Kattappana and see where did Jolly grow up.

And after speaking to Jolly's family in Kattappana, I came to understand.

Jolly's family is actually a family of farmers.

She was really not comfortable

being in a house where people were expected to do work for a living.

She was flamboyant.

She wanted to live a cool life.

I think that was there when

Jolly decided to get married to Roy

because the Ponnamattam family is a very established family in Koodathayi.

Uh, this is a family which is settled in a different part of the state altogether,

a different culture and everything, so...

getting married into a, a family of employed people

could mean a different lifestyle altogether.

Maybe she would have the kind of luxury which she had wanted.

As children,

we grew up in the same circumstances and conditions

as any other normal family would.

My elder brother, sister and I.

Rojo, myself, and the neighborhood kids,

we were a big gang and we would play together all the time.

But in those days, my eldest brother, Roy, was a bit introverted.

He wasn't interested in coming out and playing with us.

There was an age difference of six and a half years between Roy and me.

So I always regarded him with a lot of respect

and, of course, I was also a little scared of him.

My mother was a teacher in a nearby school.

By that time, almost all the children in our village had been taught by her.

My father worked in the education department,

which is why he was highly respected and influential in the community.

A lot of importance was given to education in our family.

A few years later, when Roy was studying for his pre-degree,

uh, Rojo, who was a very mischievous kid at the time,

came and told me something that took me totally by surprise.

Rojo came and told me that he had found a letter

and that it was addressed to Roy,

it was from someone called Jolly,

and it looked like some kind of a love letter.

I opened the letter and read it,

and I immediately understood what it was.

Jolly Joseph of Kattappana had sent the letter.

The very first time I met Jolly,

we were at my Uncle Mathew Manchadiyil's housewarming ceremony.

Jolly happens to be the daughter

of my Uncle Manchadiyil Mathew's wife's brother.

Um, she was a lot shorter than I expected

and I noticed her because of her high-heeled sandals.

People didn't wear high heels very often in those days, but Jolly did.

Back then, when youngsters liked each other,

they would exchange such letters.

They didn't have any other means of communication.

So it was through these love letters that their relationship grew.

Roy finally admitted that he was in love.

He made it very clear that he was serious about her.

My father did not approve of this relationship.

The main reason for his disapproval was that she was related to the family.

Jolly told everyone she was a qualified professional,

that she received a Master's degree in Commerce with 50% marks.

On hearing this, my mother said, "That's good,

once Jolly comes here to live with us, she can always pursue her career.

And since she has studied commerce,

it will be easy for her to get a good job."

So my mother was already thinking along those lines.

She wanted them to settle down as soon as possible.

I remember it was raining throughout the wedding.

Now, people look back on that day and say that the rain was a bad omen.

A sign of bad things to come.

My father wasn't happy at all.

He seemed quite upset about the marriage even during the wedding ceremony.

I remember noticing that he was avoiding her as much as possible.

This was the first wedding in the family,

so naturally, there was a lot of excitement.

We never imagined that this marriage would be such a disaster.

Seventeen years ago, Jolly Joseph married Roy

and moved here to Koodathayi

and into the home of Tom and Annamma Thomas.

This well-respected family welcomed her with open arms,

which makes what Jolly did in this house all the more shocking.

The Ponnamattam house is right in front of ours,

so we are next-door neighbors.

I first met Jolly when she got married and moved here.

She was very warm and friendly,

she always had a smile and a kind word for everyone.

She always used to ask how we are doing.

She was very popular around here. She was the star of the neighborhood.

That's all she was.

Since they were newlyweds, they were invited to lunch by the neighbors.

They were welcomed into my father and my mother's circle of friends

and by our extended family.

And gradually over time,

Jolly managed to carve out a place for herself

within our family and also our community.

Roy would leave for work every morning.

So Jolly would be free all day.

She learned how to cook and take care of the house.

She also liked to cook traditional food.

We would go out to eat together at restaurants,

we would wander around the city.

We would also go shopping together.

Um, Jolly was crazy about shopping, especially when it came to jewelry.

Jolly seemed very happy.

But then my mother said,

"You shouldn't sit idle at home, especially with your qualifications.

You should get a job and settle down.

Once you start working and supporting Roy by earning a good living,

then both husband and wife can share life's burdens equally."

I would tell my mother that, "Amma, let her make her own decisions."

Jolly Joseph's mother-in-law came

from a completely different background and culture.

When a mother-in-law says that an educated girl

should not sit idle at home,

then that's a... very healthy outlook, you know.

It's a very good perspective for a woman to have.

But where Jolly was concerned, it was a lot of pressure.

Some young women don't want to go out and get a job.

They prefer to stay at home.

And then, it turned out she was pregnant, she was pregnant with Remo.

So my mother dropped the whole issue.

The house in Ponnamattam, Koodathayi

is where I was born and raised.

I have a very strong attachment to that place

because I spent a lot part of my life there.

I was the first child in the family.

I got all the love and attention that the first child usually does.

Our family was very large.

And I remembered us being a very happy family.

After Remo was born, my mother raised the issue again.

She tried to reassure Jolly saying,

"You can go to work now, Jolly, I'll take care of the baby."

She said, "You don't have to worry, he'll be fine with us."

Because Jolly was so qualified,

she wanted her to get a good job and be set for life.

My mother said this repeatedly.

What I learned from my investigation,

is that ever since Jolly married into that family,

she'd been claiming that she had a Master's degree in Commerce.

She admitted to me, uh, this degree...

"This degree that I created in my name

was the greatest mistake I ever made in my entire life."

She told me that her mother-in-law,

Annamma Thomas had no idea

that Jolly did not have these education qualifications.

Annamma was always telling Jolly, "You have such high qualifications,

why aren't you trying to get a job, why aren't you going out and working?"

So there was a lot of arguments about this in the family.

And when this issue intensified, Jolly's father decided to visit her.

Jolly knew that Annamma would speak to her father

about her getting a job.

She also knew that when Annamma brought up this issue,

her father would say that Jolly does not have such qualifications

and Jolly's lies would be exposed.

We were all sitting down having a nice breakfast in the morning.

My elder brother was playing loud music upstairs.

I had a clear view of the dining room

from where I was in the kitchen.

I was busy making chicken curry.

I saw my mother pick up a glass of water and carry it away.

I still remember that after about 20 minutes, I got a nagging feeling,

"I better check on Amma, I better check on Amma."

That thought kept running in my mind.

When I got there, I saw my mother sitting on the bed

with her legs stretched out,

leaning against the window.

She had tears in her eyes. So I asked her, "What happened? What's wrong?"

She said, "I'm going to die. Call everyone."

I rushed and shut off the electricity fuse.

I ran downstairs to be by my mother's side.

She was lying on the bed looking terrified.

All the blood had rushed upwards and her face had gone bright red,

she said, "I can't breathe, I think I'm gonna die."

So I told my brother to call the doctor immediately.

My mother's legs went up like she was having a seizure,

her body began to convulse.

The doctor finally arrived.

He checked her pulse and told us to take her to the hospital immediately.

We rushed her to Omassery Hospital

in a jeep, it was going at full speed with its headlights on.

I didn't even wait for the jeep to stop,

I rushed straight into the emergency ward at the hospital.

I told the doctor, "Please do whatever you can to save her."

They wheeled her inside quickly.

Five minutes later, the doctor said she was no more.

All of Koodathayi mourned her death.

We were just devastated.

I could not get over my mother's death. It consumed me mentally and physically.

My mind kept telling me that she'll come back.

But, of course, she never came back.

At that time, we didn't have any suspicions about our mother's death.

It looked like a hereditary stroke.

The circumstances didn't raise any suspicions.

The first victim was Annamma, who died in 2002.

Because she was a little old and she was suffering from a lot of illnesses,

the family did not really insist on a postmortem.

A suspicious death in 2002

was reported to the police after a span of 18 years.

So tell me, what kind of evidential value can it have now?

Yes, it is a fact that Jolly's mother-in-law died a sudden death.

But there's no way to know if it's a murder,

or let's say a heart attack, or maybe a case of suicide?

It is completely up to the prosecution to prove one of the three.

And I can tell you right now that in Annamma's case,

the evidence they have is simply not strong enough.

After the funeral, I noticed that Jolly had changed.

She had a complete different personality

from the one she had before my mother's death.

Jolly took over all of my mother's duties inside the house

and out in the community,

and she did it very well.

And just like my mother, Jolly became the most important person in the family.

My mother had written in her diary

that she had deposited some money in my name.

She had also left some gold jewelry for me. I had no idea about it.

Then suddenly, Jolly tells me,

"Your mother wrote in her diary

that she's left certain things for you, right?

Apart from those things,

you're not going to get anything else from this property here."

But this behavior was only towards me.

Her behavior towards outsiders and of course towards my father

was very different.

I always used to wonder that, "Why does she treat me like this?

What has she got against me?"

Uh, like one morning,

someone asked me for something and I handed it all like I usually do.

And Jolly immediately told me that,

"You can't give anyone things from this house without asking for my permission."

She literally told me, "You can't do anything without asking me first."

I couldn't tell my father what was going on.

I couldn't tell him that Jolly was mentally torturing me.

I couldn't tell him because he was going through a very traumatic time himself.

A few days later, Jolly came up to me and said,

"I have decided, I'm not going to work.

Someone needs to be at home and I have to take care of your father.

I can't go off and leave the family like that."

I think this was always the plan.

That once my mother was gone, Jolly would take over.

And that's exactly what happened.

With the death of her mother-in-law,

Jolly assumed the role of the matriarch.

As the authoritative figure in the Ponnamattam family,

she'd relish the respect and attention she received from everyone.

And in fact, uh, she must have desired it.

It's probably something she always wanted.

Jolly Joseph must have thought that by taking her mother-in-law's place,

her family, her relatives, and her entire community

would now see her as a very important person.

Jolly soon realized one thing.

That my mother had a reputation as a teacher.

She had the love and respect of the whole community.

So if Jolly wanted the same respect,

she would have to go and get a teacher's job.

One day, when I called my father,

he gave me a surprising news.

He said Jolly had got a job as a guest lecturer at NIT.

My father said, "It's a good thing because it's not far from our house."

And even though she's a guest lecturer now,

she could be made permanent later.

When I asked him what her salary would be,

he said, "She mentioned 40,000 a month."

I was very young when she got the job at NIT.

And NIT is a very large institution.

They have a canteen where we would go and have a meal together

and then come back home.

Once she got the job, she earned a great deal of respect

among the people of Koodathayi.

She was always given a special preference because she was a lecturer at NIT.

People in the community were very impressed

with how humble and pleasant she was.

How she easily mingled with everyone being an NIT lecturer.

NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, CALICUT

When you tell people you're a professor at NIT,

they always go, "Wow."

You immediately earned their respect.

Especially since Jolly's background shows that

she was born and raised in a family of farmers.

It was a big achievement for a girl from a farming family to come this far.

This was when Jolly had finally earned the respect of the whole family,

my mother's family and my father's family.

When relatives visited our home,

Jolly would always welcome them very warmly.

She enjoyed playing the hostess, cooking their favorite meals, et cetera.

I remember very often when guests were present,

Jolly would bring my father's shirts

and put them on the ironing table which was just below the stairs.

That way, everyone could see her ironing his clothes.

I got married in 2005,

and then I moved to Colombo with my husband.

In April 2007, my father came over for a one-month visit.

Then in 2008, he came to visit us again and stayed for a month.

That's when I noticed that he was looking very thin and unhealthy.

He wasn't his old self.

I had a feeling that he was mentally down and that something was troubling him.

Tom Thomas was upset with Jolly Joseph

because M.S. Mathew had begun to visit their home very often.

M.S. Mathew is the son of Annamma's elder brother.

Mathew was working as a salesman in a jewelry store.

And he had grown close to Jolly.

Tom Thomas had become aware of Mathew's visits

and he confronted Jolly Joseph about this.

He asked her why Mathew came home so often,

what was the purpose of his visits.

Jolly never gave any explanations, she just made up excuses.

It was then that my father started opening up to me.

He said, "Jolly leaves the house saying that she's going somewhere

and then I see her going somewhere else.

When I ask her about it, she just beats around the bush.

And she's always in a corner talking on the phone,

or she's out in the garden with her phone."

My father was very upset. He couldn't understand what was going on.

Tom Thomas was in the habit of having a capsule, uh,

after his evening coffee.

They were some sort of mushroom capsules.

That evening, it was Jolly who handed Tom Thomas his capsule.

Thomas swallowed the capsule

and he immediately began to experience some discomfort.

He suddenly became unconscious and fell on the floor.

Very close to the washbasin.

But did Jolly make more attempts to help her father-in-law?

She just quietly left the room.

Then she called up a neighbor

who brought an auto rickshaw and took him to the hospital.

Tom Thomas died before he could reach the hospital.

They took too much time to get my father to the hospital.

I asked them, "Why did it take so long?"

She said, "Renji, I couldn't find the car keys, that's why it took so long."

Everyone thought that Roy's father's death

was caused by a heart attack.

By calling it a heart attack,

Jolly managed, uh, to prevent an autopsy from being done

and his body was taken home.

He was buried next to my mother.

While my father was being laid to rest,

I saw Jolly and M.S. Mathew standing on one side,

having a private conversation.

So I asked my brother,

"What's going on between them?

Why are they standing separately, whispering to each other?"

To which my brother replied,

"They've had some cash transactions. It must be about that."

When I went through the second case in detail,

I found the evidence presented to be very weak.

I mean, she told everyone that her father-in-law

had suddenly died of a severe heart attack and they just believed her.

And that's quite possible that's what happened.

But why did the doctor believe her?

Wasn't it the doctor's job to investigate whether

the patient had died of a heart attack?

What if there was any other reason for his death?

Since when has medical science relied on the statement of a mere witness

to determine the actual cause of death?

The next victim in the case was Tom Thomas

who died in 2008.

There was a difference of six years

between the first two deaths in this case.

But because there was a huge gap

between the first and the second deaths, or the murders in this case,

it was very difficult for the family members

to assume something suspicious in this,

because there was nothing unusual about it.

Because of the way this poison was used, there wasn't any visible injuries

or visible... Or anything that would suggest that this was a murder.

I remember Jolly was crying uncontrollably during the funeral,

especially towards the end

when the body was being lowered into the grave.

But when we got back home that day,

she was back to being the same Jolly she was after my mother died,

managing everything efficiently,

taking over everything.

After my mother's death, we already felt like

there wasn't much place for us in that house.

Now with my father gone, there was no place left at all.

From the time I have known Jolly, I had never been very close to her.

At the time of the deaths,

she called me over to that teak tree

and said that she had something to tell me.

I asked her, "What is it?"

She said, "There will be three deaths in this house."

She said, "The house and the land are not in the right place

and that the well is in the wrong place too.

For that, we need to build a wall around the well

and the tree in front needs to be cut down.

If all these issues are resolved, the deaths will stop."

I asked Jolly how she knew all this.

She said, "Our Priests and our Elders have told me to do this."

I stopped talking to her.

I decided I wasn't going to have any more contact

with any member of the Ponnamattam family.

You won't believe

I used to be so close to them, they were like my family.

But now, I just avoid them. No contact.

After Tom and Annamma, the next death in the Ponnamattam family

wouldn't occur for another two years,

which allowed Jolly the opportunity to quell any suspicions about the deaths

and rebuild trust with her neighbors and people in the town.

After that, our family became even smaller.

Then, when I was four or five years old, studying in lower or upper kindergarten,

my mother, uh, became pregnant with my brother.

I, uh, was very excited when my younger brother was born.

The whole family celebrated his arrival.

After many years, our family was happy again.

We had some wonderful moments

and we were a happy family for quite a long time.

But gradually, as I grew older,

I began to understand more about what was happening in the family.

I could see the issues that were happening in the house.

When we were younger, we weren't really bothered

about all these kinds of problems, we didn't pay much attention.

But as time went on, we gradually began to grow a little apart,

meaning distance from my mother,

even my father and she had started to grow apart.

It was really sad that as if everyone had split up,

with each one living in a different corner of the house,

it felt lonely.

My mother always seemed to be busy,

saying she had some paper evaluations or college work or something.

She never had any time.

This meant me and my brother feel like

we didn't have a place in her life anymore.

Then it turned out that Roy's business was in trouble,

it was not doing as well as he had expected.

They had run out of money.

Roy didn't have any other means of income

and this became a problem towards the end.

A few days before the incident, Rojo told me that Jolly had called

to say that she was thinking of getting a divorce.

She said that Roy wasn't taking good care of the family and whatnot.

Then one evening at the house,

while Rojo and I were sitting in my father's room,

Roy suddenly walked in.

I saw that Roy had...

a photocopy of my father's will, two pages.

He said that my father had left the house and property

to Jolly and him in his will.

Renji immediately took it from him and asked,

"Is this the will?"

It's not on a stamp paper

and there are no witness signatures on it.

Suddenly, there was pin-drop silence.

And then, they both walked out of the room.

I just told Rojo, "Keep this will with you."

I do think that there was some sort of give-and-take

between Jolly and Roy as far as lies go.

Roy definitely knew some of her lies

because, uh, he himself was part of those lies.

I think they had a fallout.

Uh, perhaps that is when the lies started coming out.

And Jolly must have thought that something has to be done about it.

Roy was fully aware of Jolly's affair with Mathew.

He and Jolly had arguments about it.

He started asking her angrily

about her relationship with Mathew,

and why she insisted on continuing the affair.

Jolly must have thought it was pointless

to stay married to Roy.

On 30th September 2011,

Jolly gave the children an early dinner

then she took them upstairs and put them to sleep.

Then at 8:00, she came downstairs,

she went into the kitchen,

and prepared some rice and chickpea curry for Roy's dinner.

When Roy came home, he went upstairs

and jokingly asked the kids if they were pretending to sleep.

Then he came downstairs, ate his dinner, and began to feel uneasy.

He went straight to the bathroom.

She told me that Roy had come home at around 3:00 p.m.

and he had rice and chickpea curry.

And then, he didn't eat anything for the rest of the night.

When she went to make an omelet, Roy was in the bathroom.

After frying the omelet, she went and knocked on the bathroom door

but he didn't respond.

The day Roy died, I was sitting right here when I got a call.

She said, "Roy isn't opening the door,"

and she asked me if I could come over and help her.

I rushed to their house and found Roy lying on the floor

and foam was coming out of his mouth.

Roy's uncle, Mathew, had also arrived by then.

We picked him up and rushed him to the hospital.

But they said his condition was critical and that he was too far gone.

I got a call at 11 o'clock...

my brother Roy had passed away.

We woke up and saw the lights on in the house.

One of our relatives, an aunt, was sitting beside us on the bed.

I looked at her half asleep,

and she said my father had slipped and fallen in the bathroom

and that he had been taken to the hospital.

So I quickly went downstairs

and saw my papa's framed photograph on the table in the living room.

There were candles burning

and there were flowers arranged all around the photograph.

That's when we finally realized our father wasn't coming back.

Their Uncle Mathew felt

that there was something suspicious about Roy's death.

He insisted that a postmortem be carried out on Roy.

Jolly argued that he's already gone.

Why is the need for a postmortem?

However, it was due to Manchadiyil Mathew's insistence

that the case was taken up and a postmortem was conducted.

The report from the doctor who conducted Roy's postmortem

very clearly states that Roy's death was caused by the consumption of cyanide.

Jolly told us that Roy had debts

amounting to lakhs of rupees.

And that's why he had committed suicide.

I blamed my brother for what happened.

I thought how could he kill himself after going into so much debt?

We were angry and disgusted with him.

I told Renji, "He owes people lakhs of rupees.

How in God's name are we going to repay it all?"

But no person came forward.

Till this very day, not a single person has called Renji or me

to say that Roy had borrowed any money from them.

His own wife said there was no need for an inquiry.

Then how could we push for it?

So we put it down in writing that we had no doubts about his death.

After Roy's death, three members of the same family

had died in eerily similar ways.

One has to wonder why the remaining family members were not more alarmed,

why so many red flags were missed at the time,

and why more could not have been done

to prevent the most shocking and horrific deaths yet to come.

I am the chief of Poison Control Center

at Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences in Kerala.

There is a toxicological dictum.

When you come across cyanide in a case of death,

first suspect murder, regardless of what anybody may say.

Relatives or the others around may say, "This is accidental, this is suicide..."

But first, rule out murder.

Then you can latch on to suicide.

I'm surprised that, uh, it did not strike the police.

They knew about the cyanide in the 2011 postmortem report.

Which makes one wonder that why Manchadiyil Mathew

did not ask for further investigation?

Why didn't the siblings ask for it?

The substance that was mentioned in the postmortem report,

why did the police let it go and not investigate further?

Instead of conducting a thorough investigation into Roy's death,

the police preferred to blame my client Jolly for this murder.

The truth is the police completely overlooked

the suspect of the case

and therefore, they failed to take any action.

When they went to Roy's house to investigate,

Jolly must have told them that this was a suicide

and asked them to leave the matter alone.

Normally, the police, uh...

would never expect the housewife

to commit such crimes against her own family.

Especially this family.

That turned out to work in Jolly's favor.

Cyanide is very hazardous, everybody knows.

When cyanide attacks,

even if oxygen is present in the body,

it cannot be utilized by tissues, that's how the person dies.

Generally speaking,

cyanide poisoning can mimic a heart attack.

If a large quantity has been administered or ingested,

or that is swallowed, it will cause the same kind of collapse.

However, cyanide is almost impossible to get by legitimate means in Kerala.

So anybody who wants cyanide

will have to get the license first.

For instance, goldsmiths use salts of cyanide for polishing the metal.

Now, a person who wants to kill may not have,

you know, the patience to go hunting and get hold of cyanide.

As I said, it would be extremely difficult for Jolly to acquire the cyanide.

So if she did, how did she possibly get it?

Or who helped her get it?

Losing our father was very traumatic

as death was the greatest tragedy of our lives.

The thing is, at that age, it's really difficult to, you know,

open up to your friends about your father's death and your feelings

and how hard it is for you to lose your father at a young age.

We were losing everyone.

First, our grandmother, then our grandfather,

and now we lost our father.

It was a time of constant grief and loss.

And then gradually, we adjusted to a life

where it was just the three of us living together.

It was then that the real struggle began.

We had to face life's challenges one after another

and figure out a way to cope with everything.

When I went to the panchayat office to pay the land tax,

I found that Jolly had started the process

of transferring the house and property to her name.

Rojo immediately called to tell me what had happened.

I was shocked, I said,

"How can the ownership be changed just like that?"

I asked Rojo to find out what kind of document she had produced

to transfer the ownership to her name.

She had a fake will made.

I saw that this will included all the details

that I had said were missing in the previous will.

The ownership that was initially in the name of Tom Thomas

had been transferred to Roy Thomas,

and from there, it had been transferred to Jolly Joseph.

This time there was a notary's signature

and all the stamps were in place.

I had told Rojo long back to lock the previous will away in his cupboard.

Luckily, he still had it.

I told him this one document is enough to prove

that she's making a false claim.

Rojo said we have to put a stop to this.

We have to transfer the ownership of the property back in our father's name.

We simply cannot allow Jolly to illegally lay claim to this property.

We have to get it back somehow.

I called all the elders of the family

and told them what was going on.

I showed them the previous will.

I told them, "This is the document that was shown to us

just after our father passed away.

Now take a good look at this document, did my father come back from the dead

and add all these details to this new will?"

That's all I asked them.

I went back to the panchayat office several times

and got everything transferred back to my father's name.

For the sake of the children, we didn't sue her then.

My brother had died just a year ago.

If she went to jail, what would the children do?

So thinking about their future, we forgave her

and allowed them to stay in that house.

At that time, my Uncle Mathew Manchadiyil

would call very often

and tell me about everything that was going on.

And so, uh, Jolly began to realize

that Uncle Manchadiyil and I shared a close rapport

and that we used to talk to each other all the time,

sharing our thoughts, and even discussing Jolly.

He had always been a bit suspicious of Jolly's behavior.

So, on the day Roy died,

it was Manchadiyil Mathew who insisted that Roy's body be sent

for the postmortem.

After the postmortem, Manchadiyil Mathew would keep telling people,

"I don't know what it is, but something's wrong.

How could Roy die suddenly like that?

Something is very fishy."

But at the same time, he kept in touch with Jolly, um,

and he was a frequent visitor at her house.

And that's how he found out that Jolly was having an affair with M.S. Mathew.

He warned Jolly, telling her

she shouldn't continue the affair with Mathew, that it wasn't right.

Jolly didn't like his advice.

One day, around 5:30 to 6:00 in the evening,

I suddenly got a call from Jolly.

"Kunjumon Achayan" was the name we had for Uncle Manchadiyil.

She said, "Kunjumon Achayan is no more."

I said, "Kunjumon Achayan is dead?

I just spoke to him in the afternoon not more than two hours ago."

"Yes, Renji, I brought him to the hospital but he passed away.

In fact, I'm calling you from the hospital."

In 2014 was when Mathew had died

under very similar circumstances as that

of the three people who died initially.

According to the police,

Mathew started becoming a threat to Jolly

and that is when Jolly decided that Mathew should also be dead.

I haven't seen any evidence to suggest

that Jolly Joseph administered any kind of poisonous substance

to murder this person named Mathew Manchadiyil.

Unfortunately, no postmortem was conducted.

From what I understand,

there was some kind of rift or disagreement

between Jolly and Mathew Manchadiyil since 2011.

Now if that was really the case,

then Mathew Manchadiyil would have avoided having any kind of contact with Jolly.

Instead, he maintained a close relationship with her.

When you look at all six murders in total, you can see

that they've been committed over a long span of 17 years,

from 2002 to 2019.

From Annamma Thomas's murder down to the last murder,

the gap between each killing keeps decreasing.

At first, there's a six-year gap,

then a five-year-gap,

and then it comes down to just two years.

That she took so many years in between each murder

could have helped her obfuscate her crimes.

The lady alleged to have committed the crimes,

I think, did a lot of study over a period of time

and became more and more perfect as the time went by.

How to use the poison, how much to use it,

what situation to use it in.

But even though in this particular case, the alleged perpetrator

did kill a number of people over a period of time,

she is not the classical serial killer.

Because the motives, they're completely different.

Serial killers are anyone who commits more than two murders

and, uh, they commit it in between having cooling periods.

Uh, serial murders also have a specific kind of signature

or a pattern that is followed.

As far as Jolly is concerned,

she tried her best to maintain two versions of herself for so long,

doing what the society expects out of her.

But on the other hand, she is

allegedly planning murders, committing these acts.

Whether we want to call her a serial killer or not,

the only consistent thing is the use of cyanide as poison,

but she also, um, seemed to have a legitimate motive,

which is financial gain.

She wanted to acquire her husband's property

and her own family's property which is understandable.

She dreamed of being well-off.

In fact, she wanted all the comfort in life.

She wanted to make her life better, you know.

To make it more... To make it more secure.

But to acquire that, she committed crimes

and she lost track of, uh, reality

and, uh, instead, she slowly slipped into a world of, uh, fantasy,

which is very unfortunate.

I see Jolly as a woman who created a wall of her own,

an unrealistic wall,

where she felt she could do whatever she wanted,

but her actions had real-life consequences.

Jolly's relentless pursuit of the life she desired was unquenchable.

And with her options more limited than before,

she began searching for a way forward.

Jolly set her eyes on Shaju as her second husband.

She told everyone that if she had a husband like Shaju,

she would be a very happy woman.

Shaju Zacharias was Roy's first cousin.

Jolly was sure that Shaju would be able to take care of all her needs.

He had a good job as a teacher and was financially well-off.

And Jolly didn't want to have any more responsibilities.

I remember Jolly always used to tell me.

"Sili is so lucky.

Shaju has a steady job. She can take it easy.

She doesn't have to do much work at home," she always used to say this.

Shaju Zacharias had two children.

The elder child was Abel and the little one was Alphine.

But for Jolly to marry Shaju,

she would have had to get rid of Sili.

She had already killed her husband,

her husband's mother and father, and then his uncle,

and she'd got away with it.

And now she was planning the next one.

On May 1st, 2014,

the family was celebrating Abel's first Holy Communion.

Everyone had gathered at Shaju Zacharias' house for lunch.

And just as everyone was sitting down to eat,

Jolly and her kids walked in.

We were all invited to the first Holy Communion,

and we were having a really good time.

We told Sili to come and join us for lunch.

We invited her to come and sit with us so we could eat together.

The four of us sat down at the table

and we asked them to start serving the food to everyone.

During this time, Alphine's aunt was trying to feed her

while holding her in her arms.

And suddenly, Alphine's body started jerking.

She fell forward and she was pushing her aunt back.

It was like she was trying to jump out of her aunt's arms.

Even though I was in shock,

I could clearly see that Alphine's pupils were disappearing.

They were moving...

I mean her eyeballs were moving upwards.

Everyone went running towards the child.

There was complete panic.

No one knew what had happened.

When the child fell unconscious,

Sili got so upset, she went into shock.

They rushed her to Omassery Hospital.

Uh, the doctors there said her condition was critical

and they shifted her to, uh, a ventilator.

At the time, the family believed Alphine had choked

on the food her aunt was feeding her.

But to learn that a two-year-old child had been poisoned was just horrific.

Jolly was not just a woman, but a mother.

How could someone with her background

callously murder a baby and feel no remorse?

She was a two-year-old child.

That, you know, brings to question

the basic humanity of the person who committed this.

Women are looked up to as mothers, as nurturers, as caregivers.

And the fact that a woman is capable of killing an innocent child

shatters that belief system to the, uh, to the core.

Alphines case has left everyone baffled

because why would Jolly kill an innocent little child?

What could her motive possibly be?

I pushed her by repeatedly asking her this question,

"Jolly, why would you want to kill an innocent child?"

To my question, Jolly replied,

"Tell me what would I achieve by taking the life of an innocent little child?

The child wouldn't have got in the way of my marriage.

She was a minor."

Even if she had killed the mother,

she could have gotten married and brought up the little child.

Why kill the child when she could easily take care of her?

That's why I strongly believe that

the truth behind this case lies somewhere else.

After Alphine's death in 2014,

Sili began to struggle.

She went into a severe mental depression.

It was during this time that Jolly befriended Sili

and they became very close.

Jolly had taken the initiative.

Soon, Sili started telling Jolly

everything about her and Shaju.

She mentioned that they wanted another child

and during one of these chats,

she just happened to mention that they wanted another baby girl.

Then Jolly suddenly tells Sili,

"My father-in-law used to take this particular capsule."

Jolly persuaded Sili to buy the mushroom capsules

saying that they are good for her overall health.

And that they are particularly good at providing relief

from fatigue and depression.

The last in this case was Sili,

who was Shaju's wife.

Shaju's wife actually died while she was waiting at the reception

of a dental hospital or a dental clinic in Thamarassery.

Shaju was also there, Sili was there,

and also Jolly was there.

Sili and Jolly were sitting outside, in the visitor's... visitor's room.

Not really a room, but a hall of sorts.

They were waiting there.

Now Jolly already had a mushroom capsule ready

filled with cyanide.

She handed it to Sili and said,

"Take this mushroom capsule, you'll feel better."

Sili believed her and took it.

As soon as she took it, her body began to jerk.

She fell backwards almost immediately.

After Sili passed away,

the doctors at this hospital where Sili was admitted told me

that they had insisted on a postmortem.

So at that time, Shaju outrightly refused a postmortem.

He said that postmortem is not required

and he said that postmortems are not common in our families.

As a lawyer,

I have to wonder if it was actually the 13th witness in this case, Shaju,

who really wanted to eliminate his first wife Sili,

and his child Alphine.

As we investigate this case further, we start to look at other evidence.

We can see another scenario where Shaju is probably the one

who killed his wife and child,

so he could get married to Jolly unhindered.

Then I heard about Sili's death,

I made a point to go to her funeral.

Because I hadn't been able to visit when she'd lost her child.

I felt like I must go this time.

When Jolly saw me arrive, she came out of the house and said,

"Come in, Sili's body is inside."

I looked at Sili lying in her coffin.

I told Jolly she looked so beautiful as if she's sleeping.

And she said, "Yes, Renji, but what can be done?

It's just so unfortunate."

And then she said, "I'm going to get her body ready for the next ritual."

And I said, "Yes, please carry on."

I watched Jolly tend to Sili's body in the coffin.

Jolly was taking care of everything during Sili's funeral.

Sili's brother was there too,

but it was Jolly who ordered him to get the candles, to get the flowers.

It was Jolly who prepared and arranged for everything.

As I was watching her,

I felt mentally disturbed about what was going on.

My eyes moved away from Sili's body

and I started watching Jolly

who was moving around tending to Sili's body,

picking up a flower here, placing it there.

I looked at Jolly's face

and I felt there was something strange about it.

Um, I sense that there was something different about them.

By different, I mean, uh, I felt that deep inside, Jolly was happy.

And somehow, this was reflected on her face, her expression.

I could feel it.

I just stood there stunned.

A thought suddenly struck my mind.

"Had Jolly taken Sili out of the equation so that she could be with Shaju?

Did Jolly kill Sili?"

This horrifying thought began to haunt me all the time,

it was very disturbing.

Then I thought that maybe the baby had also been an obstacle.

Because even after getting rid of Sili, a little two-year-old child

would have been a burden for Jolly.

I just knew that something was not right.

Time went by and, uh, a whole year passed

after Sili Auntie's death.

And everyone, uh, mourn her passing on her first death anniversary.

Then one day, Amma called me

and she said she had some personal news to give me.

She said that she had received a proposal.

She said, "Kariachan Pappan had bought a marriage proposal

and he was suggesting that Shaju and I

should get married and settle down together."

And then she asked me if she should accept the proposal or not.

She was just asking me as a formality, nothing else.

It was a way for her to get my approval.

If my mother and Shaju wanted to get married to each other,

I wasn't going to be the one to stand in their way.

And that's how I felt about it at that time.

By now I'd realized that Jolly always had

every intention of getting married to Shaju.

And once the two of them made it official,

it became clear that she had achieved her goal.

I always used to tell Rojo, there is a verse in the bible that says,

"Whatever is done in the dark will come to light someday."

I said, "Whatever she's hiding from all of us,

it's all going to come out into the open someday, at the right time.

You wait and see," that's what I told Rojo.

I truly believe that no matter how clever a criminal might have been

covering all her crimes,

however brilliant she may be,

God will make sure that she leaves some evidence behind,

and there will be justice.

And that's when I decided

that I was going to do something about this.

I told Rojo that I wanted a copy of Roy's postmortem report.

When I looked at Roy's death certificate,

I noticed that the time of death recorded was 11:20 p.m. late at night.

We know that cyanide immediately shuts down respiration

by stopping the body from using oxygen.

I noticed that the food he had last eaten, the rice and the chickpea curry,

was still undigested.

It was through this food that the substance had entered his body.

Then a conversation I had with Jolly suddenly came back to me.

I had come home after Roy'd passed away.

I was just talking casually with Jolly the next day

and I remember asking her,

"What was the last thing that Roy ate yesterday?"

And Jolly said, "Roy had a plate of rice and chickpea curry.

He used to love that curry.

It used to be his favorite dish.

I asked, "What time did he eat?"

She said, "He ate around 2:30 to 3:00 in the afternoon."

She also said, "He didn't have dinner that night."

Now, while I was reading all the details written down in the postmortem report.

This conversation kept coming back repeatedly in my mind.

Especially these particular words.

"He didn't have dinner that night."

It was as if a lightning bolt went through my body.

I literally had shivers down my spine.

I quickly looked at the report again.

Oh, my god.

This does not match what she told me that day.

This report says something different.

He did not eat this for lunch.

Because the body didn't get enough time to digest the food.

And since the time of death was 11:20 p.m...

Roy had definitely eaten dinner.

And that's when I realized

that Jolly was behind all the deaths.

I went to meet K.G. Simon Sir at his house in Thodupuzha.

I sat there for three hours telling him everything

that had happened in the last few years.

I told him about the sequence of deaths

and about my suspicions after reading the postmortem report.

I told him everything.

Sir said, "Renji, we will look into it.

It's a lot of work but we'll investigate it."

So we started by transferring the case

to the crime branch.

We put a team of ten people together and proceeded to open the investigation.

She presented herself as a teacher to everyone,

a teacher from NIT, at least.

That's how she introduced herself.

So it was very important that we carry out an investigation at NIT.

The investigation team arrived here on August 20th.

They asked us to check the records and see if this lady had worked here

on a permanent or temporary basis.

We then went through all the records, all the way back to the year 2000.

We gave it in writing that no such woman with that name

had ever been employed here.

He said, "There's no such person here.

No such woman has ever worked here on a temporary

or even a daily wage basis."

But Jolly always had an ID card around her neck.

We have a photo of it.

That was the source of confusion for everyone.

So Jolly destroyed the ID card.

Even though she wasn't a professor,

we expected her to have some similar qualifications.

She didn't even have that.

But Jolly Joseph had certificates showing

that she had passed the Bachelor's and Master's degree in Commerce

and other professional qualifications.

When we investigated the authenticity of the certificates.

We discovered that those certificates

belonged to someone else.

So how did she manage to do this?

Tom Thomas was an Administrative Assistant in the education department.

After his retirement, he opened up a consultancy,

it was an educational consultancy.

Now, a lot of students used to send photocopies

of their certificates

to his consultancy firm.

Jolly knew about this so she went into his office

and took a couple of certificates,

she erased the name and marks from the certificate

and then added her name and the marks that she wanted.

Then she made photocopies and put them away.

Every single thing that Jolly ever said was a lie.

During our investigation, we found that Jolly had only

studied up to her pre-degree

and this was a very crucial detail in the case.

I had decided to go to Shimla to pursue my college degree.

But, uh, since it was so far away, I couldn't go home very often.

And then one day, my mother called me up

to say that there's a legal document that's been delivered to our home.

The document said that there had been six deaths

in the Ponnamattam family

and that they were suspicious.

And that, uh, there was a newfound evidence

that had led them to reinvestigate the case.

And they were convinced that

Jolly was the chief suspect behind this string of crimes

and this was based on a written petition.

It turned out that the petition had been filed

by my paternal uncle and aunt.

My mother was informed of this by the Thamarassery police

when they... when they delivered the document.

It was around this time that my mother started calling me

and she was telling me that we have to get rid of this case.

"Please, you have to ask them to withdraw this case."

It was unbelievable.

Unbelievable that one person could commit so many murders.

It was something we only saw in the movies.

We never heard of such a thing in real life.

And so I believed what Jolly told me.

Later, uh, I called up my paternal aunt and told her that,

"Look, if there's no concrete evidence

then maybe we should just close this case, maybe."

Because I'm facing a lot of issues and it's been mentally disturbing for me.

He said, "My mother says when these deaths took place

everyone was present, it wasn't just her."

He said, "Tell Uncle that my mother said

she's going to file a defamation case against him

if he doesn't stop and take the case back."

Then my aunt got very emotional and said that,

"Remo, you don't know the half of it.

These deaths are very suspicious.

Uh, and we have a lot of doubts about them."

I said, "Remo, son,

you can call me all you want but I'm not going to change my mind."

I remember speaking to him in a very stern tone of voice.

I told him very clearly that,

"Come what may, I'm not going to withdraw my complaint."

Then one day, an article came out in the, uh, in the newspaper.

One of my friends took a photo of the news article

and he had sent it to me.

On Friday, the crime branch will open the graves of six people

who died mysteriously in Koodathayi and conduct forensic analysis.

The police has the district administration's permission to do this.

A shocking story is emerging out of Koodathayi.

Six members of a family named Ponnamattam

are suspected to have been murdered

between 2002 and 2016.

On TV channels, it was written as, uh,

"Deaths by the Koodathayi serial murderer.

The police are investigating."

In a span of 14 years, six mysterious deaths.

All the TV channels were showing our house

saying that six deaths had occurred there.

The news spread like wildfire.

My friends started calling and asking me, "Remo, what's happening inside?"

I said, "I have no idea what's going on over there."

I was traveling from Shimla to, uh, Delhi

because my connecting flight to Kerala was from Delhi.

And I was continuously listening to the news

trying to keep up with what was happening at home at that time.

The police are investigating the murders that took place

at Koodathayi.

We need to determine if there was any foul play

and we have our own methods of finding that out.

This is the first time in the history of Kerala Police

that six bodies have been exhumed at the same time.

Only those who are required to be present should enter.

When you exhume a body after six years,

then there's no guarantee

that you'll find any trace of cyanide in it.

You may find it but not for sure.

The problem in this series of cases

is no doubt going to be the chemical analysis.

Only in one case, the autopsy was done on time,

maybe within a few hours or a day,

chemical analysis was done and cyanide was detected.

Now we have a series of five dead bodies,

where we have to prove the presence of cyanide,

and some of these are buried for more than a decade.

I think it is virtually like hunting for a needle in a haystack,

trying to find

cyanide in a decomposing or decomposed body.

When news spread that the bodies were being exhumed,

everyone was furious with us.

There was a lot of pressure,

from my mother's side of the family and father's side of the family.

They even called a meeting to try and stop us.

Uh, I heard that they had actually talked about

summoning Rojo to the house and breaking his legs.

A lot of people had gathered to watch the exhumation.

And since they didn't know the reason for it,

they felt a lot of anger and resentment towards Rojo and me.

They kept asking, "Why are you doing this?

What are you going to get out of it?"

I was just standing there watching the crowd

when I heard someone say, "Poor Thomas Sir,

they won't even leave him alone in death.

They won't let him rest in peace."

I know what I'm doing is absolutely wrong.

I know everybody will say this.

They'll say that this is the biggest blunder I'll ever make.

But I told them clearly,

"I know my parents are with me. I know," I told them.

I have a mission.

So I didn't pay any attention to the crowd gathered around

and I ignored their comments.

When I got home that evening, uh, there was no one there

except for my brother.

Then Jolly arrived home a little bit later.

One look at her face and I knew she was in trouble.

She looked completely exhausted and almost...

almost panic-stricken.

Deep down, she was full of fear.

She was absolutely terrified at that time.

I told Jolly that I needed to speak with her

and I needed to know what's going on so both of us went to another room.

As soon as we entered the room, I turned around and asked her,

"What is going on?"

I was really upset that time and I told her that,

"All the news channels are pointing their fingers at you,

saying that you're the culprit."

Then I asked her very sternly,

"Did you make any mistakes in the past?

Did you have a hand in these murders?"

She's started crying and protesting.

And I remember there was complete panic in her voice.

But she said, "I didn't have anything to do with their deaths.

I'm completely innocent."

I told her, "I want you to tell me the truth

and I want you to tell me everything.

Every single detail of what had actually happened.

You've definitely done something and I want you to tell me what you did."

And I finally managed to, uh, break her down a little.

And then in a very feeble voice, she admitted that,

"Hmm, I may have made a few mistakes."

I asked her again, "Tell me, did you commit these murders?

I think it's time you tell me everything that you have done."

I was at a relative's house in Kozhikode

when Remo called me.

I asked him, "What's wrong, son? What happened?"

"This woman killed everyone."

This is what he told me.

Then I asked him, "How do you know?

Who told you about this, son?"

"She told me herself."

"Call the police right now, Auntie."

"Call the police and get her arrested."

I quickly realized that the rest of the cyanide

was still in the house.

Just a small amount was enough for the two boys.

I told him, "Grab a piece of cloth or bed sheet and stuff it in your mouth,

and don't fall asleep.

Make sure nothing goes into your mouth.

Don't eat or drink anything there."

I kept repeating this again and again.

And then I heard someone knocking on his door.

Then I heard the door open and I heard Remo asking.

"Why are you standing there? What exactly are you hoping to hear?"

As I listened from the other end, I realized that it was Jolly

who was standing outside and Remo was talking to her.

I told him, "I'll call you later," and quickly disconnected the call.

I was waiting for the night to end,

so I could go and get those kids out of the house.

The first thing I did then was call the superintendent of police.

This morning, Jolly Joseph was arrested

and taken to police custody

at her home in Koodathayi.

She will be formally charged with killing her husband, Roy.

But she is under suspicion for the five other deaths in question as well.

I had been watching all the news clips.

They brought Jolly out of the house and put her in the police jeep.

Remo was standing in the veranda.

But there was no sign of the younger son.

I kept searching for him in the news clips,

wondering where he was,

if he was still in the house or not.

The first thing I did when we got to the house was

checking on the younger son.

He was still sleeping.

The whole house had an air of neglect.

There were dishes lying unwashed in the sink.

I could see leftover food everywhere.

It seemed like nobody had bothered to clean the place for weeks.

I just closed the door and left

but by then, a crowd had gathered around the house.

Some of them tried to speak to me.

But by now, the yard had filled with people from the media.

I realized we wouldn't be able to get out.

But then something happened.

It was almost like it was a miracle.

At around three-thirty, four o'clock,

there was a huge thunderstorm with falling rain.

It rained so heavily

that the media had to disperse and move away.

I thought now is the time to leave with the kids.

Then I told the boys, "Go and pack your bags.

And take whatever you think is important to you, but do it quickly."

And then I locked the house and we left from there.

That night, while we were on our way home,

Remo showed me all the news clippings related to our case.

I saw Shaju was defending Jolly.

By this time, they had started responding to all the different news channels.

They were saying, "This is a dispute over property.

They're just doing it for the money."

I looked at Remo and said, "Just ignore these people.

Don't pay attention to what they're saying."

We reached Vyttila at exactly 5:00 p.m.

Then I got out of the taxi and opened the gate.

And as soon I walked through the gate...

I stood there for a moment looking up at the sky,

and I said to my parents,

and also to my elder brother Roy,

"I did what I could do."

Because I knew that my parents and all these other souls were with me.

That's what I believe.

I felt like they wanted to carry out this mission through me

and that's why it worked.

I'm convinced of it.

She murdered her mother-in-law to gain power.

Her father-in-law for his property.

Her husband for questioning her relationships.

Her uncle for growing suspicious about her activities.

Sili and her daughter Alphine for getting in the way of her plans

to marry Sili's husband, Shaju.

Was Jolly the mastermind behind all the murders?

The court has remanded Jolly

in police custody for six days,

until the 16th of this month.

During that time, they will be questioning her,

and perhaps the biggest unanswered question is,

"Did Jolly act alone?"

This is what Jolly told me.

Jolly had read in the newspaper

about the highly poisonous substance that acts quickly.

This poison was called cyanide.

And it was easily accessible to goldsmiths who made jewelry.

Now M.S. Mathew was in the business of selling gold jewelry.

He had been working as a salesman in a jewelry store for quite some time.

Keeping this in mind, Jolly formed a friendship with Mathew.

She asked Mathew for some cyanide,

saying that she needed to kill a stray dog that kept coming into the house.

Now Praji Kumar used to work

at the same jewelry store as M.S. Mathew.

He was a goldsmith

and had a very good relationship with Mathew.

It was Praji Kumar who gave Mathew the cyanide.

Mathew... Mathew... Were you aware of what she was doing?

How many times did you give cyanide to her?

Mathew, are you trapped in this case by someone?

Mathew was given the opportunity to tell

his side of the story in the court.

He had a chance to tell the court that he was innocent,

that this was a false case,

and that he had nothing to do with the six murders.

But when asked if he had anything to say at all,

he didn't deny being involved.

With Jolly and her accomplices

in the police custody,

K.G. Simon's case is complicated by the lack of physical evidence.

No doubt finding the cyanide used in these murders

would make that case much stronger.

The evidence-gathering process

during this case was very challenging.

Because wherever we took Jolly,

there was always a lot of intense media attention

followed by crowd and chaos.

This way.

Haven't you seen enough photos of me already?

Yes, we have seen you a lot already.

Then we took Jolly Joseph to the Ponnamattam house.

We felt as though the evidence fell right into our hands.

This is a turning point in the Koodathayi serial murder case.

Last night, the police found crucial evidence,

a bottle containing a powder,

suspected to be cyanide at the Ponnamattam house.

With all due respect to the honorable court

and with all due respect to the prosecution,

as a defense lawyer, I find it hard to believe,

that such a substance would be found in her home,

after all these years.

It's beyond my imagination.

In order to incriminate Jolly

and to prove that the allegations against her were true,

the prosecution fabricated the evidence, the potassium cyanide,

the bottle in which it was kept,

and the place where it was hidden.

I believe the whole thing was set up to fit the narrative,

to serve the purpose of their case.

Whenever I spoke to police officers,

they did not give me clear-cut answers,

which made me feel

that the police investigation was not complete.

There could have been holes in the police, uh, narrative,

which was never questioned.

These questions would actually stare back at you,

the loopholes in the case.

Jolly's case is actually made up of six cases

with a total of 263 witnesses.

If we were to conduct a trial for each case,

which is how it should be,

then the first trial would take at least one year,

the others following in succession.

So it would take six years for six cases to be concluded.

So what legal benefits is the defendant entitled to?

First, give us those legal provisions,

and I will get to the truth and prove her innocence in court.

I believe 100% that Jollyamma will succeed.

She will not be convicted at any point of time.

The case is now in the hands of the court,

our work is done.

After I retired, I got a lot of offers to take up other cases.

But I turned them down

because I wanted to spend more time with my family

and take care of them.

And that's exactly what I'm doing now.

When they filed a case against her and she was arrested...

some people didn't speak to me,

and there were some people who called me to apologize.

Yeah, but everyone was dumbstruck, our relatives too.

Looking back...

I think it was fate.

What else could it be?

Pure bad luck.

We planned to renovate the Ponnamattam house and make it...

our ancestral home again.

We want to continue living there like we used to.

Maybe then the souls of our parents will finally get some peace.

Because this was the house of their dreams.

Remo, do you think your mother acted alone?

Is she the only one who is guilty?

I'm sorry I can't say anything right now because it's not over yet

and we're still waiting for the end result.

We all want to know the end result, don't we? Huh?

I can't afford to be worn down by this process.

I have to take care of my little brother.

That I have a responsibility. I have to take care of him.

So I'm going to overcome this and I'm going to move on and that's all.

Well, I just want to say one thing.

Whether it takes 17 years or 25 years, truth will triumph.

A lot of people have asked this question.

"All of you are such educated people,

how did you not suspect what Jolly was doing?"

"How could you not know about her educational qualifications?"

To all the people who've been asking us these questions,

I have only one thing to ask them,

"When you're son is about to get married, how many of you asked to see

your daughter-in-law's educational qualifications,

her graduation certificates, or her portfolios?"

We trusted her, that's what family does, right?

She knew very well that no one would ever doubt her.

You know there is a phrase that describes people like her.

"A wolf in sheep's clothing."

If a wolf disguises itself as a sheep, then no one will know it for what it is.

Maybe that's why, in Jolly's case, she was able to hide

who she really was from everyone.

I've often wondered...

What was Jolly trying to gain with all this?

Was it for money? For power? Property?

I wanted to hear the answers directly from Jolly herself.

I was waiting upstairs.

Then Jolly came in, accompanied by several policemen and women.

When she saw me,

there was no change in her facial expression.

To be honest, I didn't have any particular feelings towards this woman.

I said, "Look, I came here to tell you

that you shouldn't call Remo so often.

It makes him very upset.

I know because I overheard him speaking very angrily with you.

You're always calling him up and saying, "Look at how they're punishing me.

Listen, I'm going to get out of here.

Come here and show me the proof that I did something wrong."

"If you keep saying these things, he's going to get more angry.

So I don't want you bothering him again."

I told her, "What bothers Remo the most

is that you have shown no remorse for what you've done.

You still haven't understood the seriousness of what you've done.

The impact that's had on the children and the rest of the family.

The children never received what they wanted from their mother.

And now they're going through this terrible time because of you.

I don't want them going through this hell anymore,

so the sole purpose of my visit is to...

put a stop to this.

I accept the fact that you are the one who gave birth to them,

I don't deny that,

I will always acknowledge you as their mother,

and I'm sure the children will too.

But this present situation

has been very hard on them

and I will not allow them to suffer anymore."

I told her, "As long as I'm alive, I won't allow it.

They're my children now.

I'm going to raise them as if they are my own."

What our aunt has done for us can't be described in just a word

or even a sentence.

The way she's loved us and cared for us

is far beyond anything we could ever imagine.

It's only now that we've really become a family.

It may seem like we're a new family,

but we're not...

We're... we're all of the same blood.

Many of our loved ones are no longer with us.

But I know that their blessings are with us.

And... and I'm sure

that they're all here with us in spirit.

And we don't dwell on the past anymore, we don't have any regrets.

Instead, we've moved on and we've all become stronger.

The person who held such a high position in our family,

who lived such a privileged life in our house,

with an army of servants and countless possessions.

Now, had to be escorted in by ten police officers.

While I was speaking to her, I couldn't help but feel a little pity.

I kept thinking what a terrible situation this person Jolly

has landed herself in so unnecessarily.

I asked her, "How do you feel about what you've done?"

"It just happened."

That's what she said, "It just happened."

"You consciously and deliberately murdered these six people.

And you didn't even spare a little child.

And now you're telling, it just happened?"

"That's because I have the mind of a criminal,

I'm very good at hiding things."

That was her reply.

Then after we finished talking, she told me, you know.

"It's written in the Bible that

no matter how much we sinned, God will always forgive us.

So God will forgive me too."

I said, "Yeah, God will forgive you.

After all, God forgives everyone, you're right."