Nanthancode mass murder: Court finds Cadell Jeansen Raja guilty of murdering four in 2017 case

Thiruvananthapuram court finds Cadell Jeansen Raja guilty of Nanthancode multiple murder case, facing possible capital punishment.

The Thiruvananthapuram Additional District and Sessions Court VI in Kerala on Monday (May 12, 2025) found Cadell Jeansen Raja, the accused in the Nanthancode multiple murder case, guilty of murdering four people, including his parents and sister.

The court will hear the arguments regarding the quantum of sentence on Tuesday (May 13). The prosecution will likely seek capital punishment, citing the case qualified as “rarest of rare”.

Judge Vishnu K. found Cadell guilty of four counts of murder under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). He was also found guilty of crimes under Section 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence) and Section 436 (mischief by fire or explosive substance with the intent to destroy house) of the IPC.

Cadell, 37, was found to have murdered his parents Raja Thankam, 60, a retired professor, and Jean Padma, 56, a retired doctor; sister Caroline, 26, and aunt Lalitha, 70, in their House No. 117 in Bains Compound, a short distance away from Cliff House in Nanthancode over two days – April 5 and 6, 2017.

The incident had come to light when their mutilated, partially charred bodies were found from the two-storied building on April 9. After committing the murders using a carpenter’s axe that he had purchased online, Cadell set the corpses on fire before fleeing the house.

When questioned by the court about his whereabouts when the murders had taken place, the accused claimed to have been in Chennai and had no knowledge of how the deaths occurred. However, the forensic report revealed the presence of the victims’ blood and traces of petrol on the accused’s clothing.

Besides, post-mortem examination indicated that most of the injuries were to the back of the head and could have been inflicted by the axe recovered from the house. Investigations found that the murder weapon was purchased through Cadell’s account on an e-commerce platform. Besides, the hard disk of his laptop contained evidence of him repeatedly watching a web-series that depicted killing people from behind with an axe and other weapons.