The Coimbatore Mahila court has handed the death penalty to a 32-year-old man, Santosh Kumar, after convicting him of the rape and murder of a seven-year-old girl.
The prosecution produced 26 witnesses before the court, while six witnesses were produced by the defence counsel. The prosecution counsel completed the argument on December 16 and the defence counsel completed its argument on December 19. The court announced that the judgement would be made on December 27.
When the case came to the argument on the judgement on Friday, the special public prosecutor U Sankaranarayanan appeared on behalf of the prosecution council and demanded capital punishment for the accused. Also, he mentioned before the court in the final argument that the council had submitted surplus pieces of evidence in order to prove the arrested person’s guilt.
However, the defence counsel claimed that the DNA test report had proved another person's involvement in the case and that the parents of the victim had petitioned before the court to re-investigate the case. As there are reasonable doubts arising in the case, capital punishment should not be given to the accused, he said.
Following the arguments, Judge J Radhika adjourned the court for the final judgement which was pronounced after 3 pm.
The seven-year-old girl was found dead near her house in a suburb of Coimbatore on March 25 this year. The autopsy confirmed that she was sexually assaulted before being murdered. The Thudiyalur All Women Police subsequently arrested her neighbour Santhosh Kumar of Uliyampalayam near Thondamuthur.
The Forensic Examination Report, which was submitted before the Mahila Court in Coimbatore on November 1, had presented a DNA sample to prove the presence of semen stains of another person besides the alleged accused in the crime.