The Supreme Court declined to grant protection from fresh FIRs to a Chennai woman accused of sending “bomb threat” emails using the dark web to frame the man she loved. The court, however, issued notice on her plea to club multiple FIRs filed across 12 states.
New Delhi: The Supreme Court of India on Friday declined to issue any “blanket order” stopping police from registering new First Information Reports (FIRs) against a Chennai-based woman software engineer who has been accused of sending “bomb threat” emails using the dark web.
The emails were allegedly sent in the name of a man she loved but could not marry.
However, the Supreme Court has agreed to examine her request to merge or “club” all the FIRs filed in different states into one case.
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Notices have been issued to the concerned states including Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Delhi, Karnataka, Kerala, Bihar, Telangana, Punjab, Madhya Pradesh, and Haryana.
The 29-year-old accused, identified as Rene Joshilda, a robotics engineer from Chennai, was arrested after police investigations into multiple bomb threat emails revealed a story of unreturned love and revenge.
The threatening emails were sent to various institutions and public places, including the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad and several other locations across 12 states.
A bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta heard Joshilda’s plea, in which she claimed that she was innocent.
Her lawyer, Senior Advocate Devadutt Kamat, argued that the emails were still being sent using her VPN (Virtual Private Network) even after she had been taken into custody.
Kamat told the court that this clearly showed that the case against her was not genuine. He said that the investigation was “not bona fide” and pointed out that “the emails were still being sent from Joshilda’s VPN even after her arrest.”
The bench then asked Kamat to produce proof of the emails that were allegedly sent after her arrest. In response, Kamat said that he would present those details during the next hearing.
According to the police, the woman, who was working at a multinational company (MNC) in Chennai, allegedly sent out the bomb threat emails after the man she wanted to marry got married to another woman. She is accused of using fake email IDs, VPNs, and the dark web to hide her identity and location.
Investigators said that some of the fake email IDs she created were actually made using the name of the man she loved.
The Supreme Court, while refusing to stop fresh FIRs from being filed against her, has agreed to hear the matter further to decide whether all the existing FIRs across the various states should be combined into a single case.
The next hearing is expected to focus on the evidence that will be presented by her lawyer to prove that the emails continued to be sent even after her arrest.
This unusual case, involving the misuse of digital technology for personal revenge, highlights growing concerns over the use of the dark web and VPNs to carry out cybercrimes across state boundaries.
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