A special court here today awarded double life sentence to eight persons for the brutal murder of a Vice-President of a company in Periyanaickenpalayam nearly six years ago.

The prosecution case was that a group of 27 persons had trespassed into Pricol, entered the room of Vice-President Roy George, HR Department, on September 21, 2009, and assaulted him with iron rods. They believed that he was instrumental in the dismissal of 42 labourers of the company’s Malumichampatti unit. George eventually died of the injuries.

They also attacked four other officials of the company, who had sustained serious injuries, needing hospitalisation.

The case was going on in the Special Court for Bomb Blasts and Judge Srinivasan awarded double life for eight accused and acquitted 19 others.

Those sentenced are Manivannan, Ramamurthy, Rajendran, Sivakumar, Saravanan,Gunapalan, Velmurugan and Sampathkumar.

The Judge also sentenced them to another five years imprisonment for assault and imposed a fine of Rs.2,000 each. The sentence will run concurrently.