Crime and Criminals

hakti Mills gangrape accused targeted 10 women in 6 months

New Plaint Shows Not Just 5 Men In Gang, More On Loose

S Ahmed Ali TNN

September 5,2013

    The Shakti Mills gangrape accused had targeted at least 10 women in the same spot over the past five-six months, said police officials investigating the case. Earlier, they were believed to have raped four women.
    Also, with another gangrape survivor coming out, it is clear the gang that preyed on women in the mill was not limited to five members. She has spoken about two others, one of whom has been taken into custody. A hunt is on for the other. “We believe many survivors may not be coming out because of the fear of the gang members on the loose,” said a crime branch officer.
    “Each of them (the accused in custody) gave different dates and descriptions of rape survivors. After collating the information, we have roughly concluded that they raped 10 women,’’ said an officer of the investigating team.
    During initial probe, the accused had said they had first molested a girl after a couple entered the mill looking for privacy. A few weeks later, they gangraped a ragpicker and, lastly, a month before attacking the photojournalist, they had brought a sex worker to the mill, raped her and did not pay.
    Now, it has emerged that six more women were targeted. The rape accused have said most of them were residents of nearby slums who used to take the tracks to reach their homes.
    Salim Ansari, 27, who it seems was involved in all the assaults, has said that they made their first attack in March when they saw a woman walking by the tracks late in the evening. “The group, posing as policemen, threatened her and forced her inside mill where they raped her. Within a few days, they targeted another woman crossing the tracks. With these two assaults going unreported, they were emboldened. They often lurked in the mills in the evenings and lay traps for unsuspecting women,” added the officer.
    Police said the modus operandi was almost the same — whoever spotted a potential target would pose as a policeman/CID officer and under the pretext of inquiry take them deeper into the ruined mill. On the side, they would have alerted their other friends. If a man was accompanying their target, they would thrash him and tie him up.
    They also seemed to have made it a habit to click their target’s photo or the rape to threaten them to keep quiet.
    Another similarity that stands out is that they never robbed their targets. They did not touch the expensive gadgets the photojournalist who was attacked on August 22 was carrying. Police said the accused have said that they knew that they could be tracked easily if they stole cellphones or tablets.
MODUS OPERANDI SAME Gang member who spotted potential target would pose as policeman and take the women deeper inside the mill on pretext of inquiry
They would call in their other friends
If a man was with the target, they would thrash him and tie him up
They would click the rape survivor’s photo and threaten her not to complain
They did not steals cellphones to avoid being tracked down
Penal Sections Invoked
    The accused have been booked under sections of the IPC from 34 (common intention), 341 (wrongful restraint), 323 (causing hurt), 342 (wrongful confinement), 376 (D) (gang rape under the amendment to the CrPC with a minimum punishment of 20 years) and 506 (II) (criminal intimidation) Evidence Courts Could Depend On
The Supreme Court has held that the statement of a survivor is a strong piece of evidence to nail an accused
Strong forensic evidence is unlikely in this case due to the time gap between the incident and the complaint
    But previous judgments upheld that the veracity and reliability of a survivor’s statement, if proved in court along with identification of the accused, would be adequate to secure a conviction, if corroborative evidence in the form of DNA tests or other forensic test results are unavailable
Consecutive Sentences?
    Criminal procedure laws under section 219 of Criminal Procedure Code read/with section 223 CrPC allows for a single trial in certain cases. But legal experts say a joint trial is not advisable in these two cases
    The maximum punishment for rape is life imprisonment, the minimum is seven years’ rigorous imprisonment
    The HC held in 2009 that a trial court can use its discretion to make sentences concurrent or consecutive. But life terms in two separate cases will run concurrently