A day after a local court dismissed his bail plea in the Nadia Torrado death case, former Goa tourism minister Fransisco Pacheco was on Thursday shifted from a district hospital to the prisoners ward in the state-run Goa Medical College (GMC).
According to sources the ex-minister was shifted from the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of Hospicio Hospital in Margao and admitted to prisoners' ward of GMC hospital at Bambolim in Panaji .
The 46-year-old NCP legislator was booked by the Crime Branch in connection with death of his close friend Nadia Torrado (28), who allegedly committed suicide after consuming poison. He has been charged with abetment of suicide and culpable homicide not amounting to murder.
Additional sessions judge Pramod Kamat had ordered Crime Branch to take custody of the former minister only after he is discharged from the hospital or certified to be medically fit.Crime Branch had requested Judicial Magistrate First Class (JMFC) to constitute a medical board - panel of doctors, to examine health status of former minister.
The investigating agencies had raised a suspicion on the health certificates provided by doctors of the Margao hospital and the genuiness of his sickness.
Pacheco is currently undergoing treatment for hypertension, jaundice and urinary tract infection. GMC sources said they are yet to constitute a panel and till then, the minister would be kept in the prisoners ward.
Pacheco, when brought to the hospital in an ambulance, refused to speak to the media.Crime branch officials said they will take Pacheco's custody only after he is medically fit.
"We want to have his custodial interrogation to get more details in the case. We will take his custody only after he is fit," an official said. PTI
