Reported by Charul Shah | Written by Sharangee Dutta | Edited by Chandrashekar Srinivasan, New Delhi
A 31-year-old man was sentenced to death Friday by a special POCSO (Protection of Children from Sexual Offences) court for sexually assaulting and killing a nine-year-old girl in Mumbai’s Nehru Nagar area in 2019. This is the man’s second conviction – he was previously sentenced to seven years imprisonment for sexually abusing another minor. However, his jail term was reduced for good conduct and he was released 11 months before committing the second offence.
The accused had killed the nine-year-old girl at the same spot he assaulted her and at night, had dumped her body in the septic tank of a public toilet.
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While delivering the verdict, the court said that the accused could not be allowed to stay in society because, once released, he may repeat the same offence.
The court also refused to grant the accused leniency, declaring out that such a man who abused minor girls one after another did not deserve the same.
In the 2019 sexual assault and murder the girl went missing and her body was found after two days in a public toilet. The accused was tracked down and arrested, and a case under the POCSO Act and sections 302 (murder), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence) and 376 (rape) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) was lodged against him.
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