The Supreme Court (SC) has ordered release of Charles Sobhraj.
A joint bench of Justices Sapana Pradhan Malla and Til Prasad Shrestha hearing a habeas corpus petition lodged by Sobhraj has ordered his release on Wednesday if he need not be jailed for another case, and added that arrangements be made to return the French citizen back to his country within 15 days.
Sobhraj pointed in his petition that he has already served 19 years and is 78 years old.
Kathmandu and Bhaktapur district courts had found him guilty in murder of American and Canadian citizens in 1975.
He was ruled to have murdered American citizen Connie Jo Bronzich in Manohara of Kathmandu and then Canadian national Laurent Carrière two days later in Sanga of Bhaktapur in December 1975.
The SC in 2010 had endorsed the life sentence slapped on him by the Kathmandu District Court. The Bhaktapur District Court had then sentenced him for the murder of Canadian national in 2014.
He has been at the Central Jail in Sundhara since his arrest in 2003.
