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Disclaimer: This article contains mentions of death and assault. Reader discretion is advised.
Dateline NBC‘s “At the Edge of Town” episode chronicles the murder of Pravin Varughese, an Indian-origin Southern Illinois University student. The upcoming episode airs on Sunday, April 28, 2024, at 10 p.m. ET. A synopsis reads, “When a college student is found dead after a party, his mother is determined to try to find out what happened. Dennis Murphy reports on the unexpected twist that no one saw coming.”
According to CBS News, 19-year-old Pravin Varughese went missing after leaving a party on the night of February 12, 2014. His body was found five days later, on February 18, in the secluded woods in the Carbondale area. Authorities and the coroner initially determined the cause of death was accidental hypothermia due to the low temperatures that night. Moreover, he was only wearing a shirt and jeans when his body was discovered, per the Chicago Tribune.
Reportedly, a second and independent autopsy Varughese’s family ordered revealed shocking details about the cause of death. Subsequently, investigators followed a trail of evidence that led them to an unlikely suspect.
What was Pravin Varughese’s cause of death & who was the killer?
Through an initial autopsy, the Jackson County coroner had ruled that Pravin Varughese’s cause of death was accidental hypothermia. According to Distractify, this autopsy report claimed that the drugs and alcohol he had consumed further contributed to the teen’s death. However, a toxicology report revealed otherwise when it came back negative.
Chicago Tribune stated that the victim’s mother, Lovely Varughese, and family pushed for an independent autopsy. They suspected foul play in the 19-year-old college student’s death from the beginning. The second autopsy then revealed Varughese’s cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head. When the results contradicted the initial findings, his family filed a lawsuit against the Illinois city of Carbondale. They also sued the police chief.
According to CBS News, Pravin Varughese allegedly got into a fight with someone at his last party on the night he went missing. CBS Chicago stated that the teen’s last tweet was timed at 11:17 p.m. on February 12, 2024. In the tweet, he wrote, “Bloody knuckles… guess I was in a fight #backdown.” Authorities claimed his fight was with the same person who was trying to drive him home.
Eventually, prosecutors named another Southern Illinois University student, Gaege Bethune, the suspect in Varughese’s death. However, Bethune alleged that Varughese drove around the city for a while after leaving the party and that the latter wanted to buy cocaine, per NDTV World. The former was giving the victim a ride back home.
Bethune stood trial for his role in Pravin Varughese’s death in 2018 on the charges of first-degree murder. The trial resulted in a conviction with a shocking twist. Prosecutors alleged that Bethune and Varughese, both drunk, got into a fight after the former tried to rob the victim. This happened while the two were driving around Carbondale that night.
Prosecutors claimed Bethune assaulted Varughese badly, severely wounding him. NDTV World reported that the former punched the victim multiple times in the head and the face. After this, the 19-year-old left his attacker’s vehicle, fled into the woods, and died there due to the cold temperatures. Lovely Varughese told Distractify that Bethune even admitted to hitting him.
NDTV stated that a jury deliberated for about seven hours before returning with a guilty verdict after a two-week-long trial. Jurors found Gaege Bethune guilty of Pravin Varughese’s first-degree murder on June 14, 2018. They also found him not guilty of a second-degree murder charge.
However, before his sentencing, Judge Mark Clarke tossed out Bethune’s conviction in September 2018. The judge’s decision came after finding a “syntax problem,” reported Chicago Tribune. He ordered a fresh trial for the then-24-year-old. The accused’s family called the judge’s decision “a blessing.” Meanwhile, David Robinson, who was a special prosecutor in the case, claimed the ruling “blindsided” him.
Pravin Varughese’s mother, Lovely, who fought to bring the case to trial, said, “We started with nothing, and we came so far.” Lovely said she and her family members had hoped it “would be the last time,” but hopes to “come back.” She added, “We will be back.”
Dateline NBC’s episode on Pravin Varughese’s 2014 death will air on Sunday, April 28.
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