One of the masterminds behind the 1988 coup d’état, Abdullah Lutheef has admitted to fleeing custody after he was granted permission to seek medical treatment abroad.
In a Criminal Court hearing held against the country's biggest traitor today, Luthfee admitted to escaping from custody before serving out the 25-year jail sentence given to him for his role in the failed coup.
He had also requested leniency when sentencing against him in the current trial.
The Prosecutor General’s Office had filed charges against the national biggest traitor for fleeing an imprisonment center under section 537 of the penal code.
The PG office said that under this charge, the defendant could be sentenced to a maximum of four years in jail while the minimum sentence would require the defendant to remain in jail for four months and 24 days.
Luthfee, who hired foreign mercenaries to attack and topple the then government in 1988, was imprisoned and sentenced to death following the attack. But former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom reduced the death sentence to a life imprisonment sentence.
Former President and current speaker of the Parliament Mohamed Nasheed granted him medical leave to seek treatment from abroad in 2010.
He fled from authorities after going abroad and lived in Sri Lanka for a few years but turned himself over to the Maldivian Embassy in Sri Lanka in May 2019. He was extradited back to Maldives and imprisoned in a Maafushi jail.
The failed attempt to topple the government in 1988 killed 19 Maldivians including members of the armed forces and civilians.
