GHAZIABAD: A Pocso court on Saturday sentenced a 20-year-old man to death for the rape and murder of a 5-year-old girl in Sahibabad, saying that “accused like wolves will remain a danger for women and humanity”.Sonu Gupta was convicted in just 45 days after the charges were framed against him by police – which lawyers said was one of the fastest trials in Ghaziabad in recent memory. On December 1 last year, Sonu, who had inhaled a whitener and was in a state of intoxication, had stalked a Class 12 student from the City Forest park all the way to the neighbourhood where the 5-year-old girl lived with her parents.Sensing she was being followed, the Class 12 girl had rushed back to her house, but Sonu loitered in the area. He spotted the child alone on a road, plucking flowers, and abducted her. In a forested area nearby, he gagged her with a diaper, raped her when she was unconscious and then strangled her.Sonu then went back to his house in Nandgram, 5km from the crime spot, and lay low. Six days later, when police knocked on his door, he told the cops, “Badhiya hai, encounter mat karna (very good, don’t shoot me).”The autopsy report highlighted the brutality with which the crime was committed. The report – signed by Dr Chandra Prakash and Dr Vikrant – said there was a 5x2cm injury mark in the private parts. “Her brain was congested, and she had a ligature mark around her neck. Her lungs were congested and the left chamber of the heart was filled. She died due to rape assault and suffocation,” it said.The prosecution produced 16 witnesses in the case.One of them, Sandeep Kanojiya, a neighbour, told the court he had seen Sonu in the area on the day the girl was reported missing. “I had seen him loitering in the locality and even asked him what he was doing there. But I went inside a little later. In the evening, I learnt that a girl from our locality had gone missing,” he said in the court.The Class 12 girl whom Sonu had followed on December 1 had also identified him before the cops. Nine days after the crime – on December 16 – the police filed a chargesheet against Sonu under the sections of kidnapping, rape, and relevant provisions of the Pocso Act and ST/SC Act. The charges were framed on December 21.Although he denied the charges initially, Sonu later admitted to have committed the crime. Rajesh Chandra Sharma, district government counsel, told TOI that Sonu had little option but to admit to the rape and murder because CCTV footage showed him loitering in the area and he also had a ticket of the City Forest where the girl’s body was found.Awadh Kumar Tyagi, who represented Sonu in court, however, argued that there was no witness to the crime.The court of additional sessions judge Amit Kumar Prajapati relied on the accounts of witnesses and the proof submitted by the police and convicted Sonu on Friday. He was sentenced to death on Saturday.”The accused has admitted that he has committed this heinous crime. Accused like wolves in the society will remain a danger for women and humanity. This is a rarest of rare crime and he deserves death punishment,” the court said.(The victim’s identity has not been revealed to protect her privacy as per Supreme Court’s directives on cases related to sexual assault)
Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ghaziabad/youth-handed-death-term-for-5-year-olds-rape-murder-in-sahibabad/articleshow/97613189.cms