Four found guilty of gang raping and killing two Dalit sisters in Lakhimpur, UP
Four of the six defendants were found guilty on Friday by a special Protection of Children from Sexual Offenses (Pocso) court in connection with the rape and murder of two Dalit sisters in the Lakhimpur Kheri area of Uttar Pradesh in 2022.
The other two minor defendants will get separate verdicts, according to a public prosecutor.
The remains of the two sisters, who were 17 and 15, were discovered hanging from a tree in their hamlet in the area on September 14, 2022. Three hours before to the discovery of their deaths, the two’s family members said that they had been kidnapped from the street in front of their home. According to the police, the accused sexually assaulted and strangled the children before hanging their corpses from a tree to make it seem like a suicide.
Six persons were detained on September 15 after a FIR was filed under the Indian Penal Code and the Pocso Act on the same day.
Brijesh Pandey, special public prosecutor (Pocso cases), said that the court set August 14 as the date for the announcement of the severity of the four offenders’ penalty.
“The court found Mohd Junaid (19) and Sunil Kumar (22) guilty under IPC sections 363 (kidnapping of minors), 376-D (gangrape of woman under 16), 302 (murder), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 452 (house-trespass alter preparation for hurt, assault, or wrongful restraint), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence related to crime), and 34 (acts done by multiple people in furtherance of common intention). They were also found guilty of penetrative gangrape with a kid and aggravating penetrative sexual assault under section 5G/6 of the Pocso Act, according to Pandey.
The other two defendants are Karimuddin (21) and Mohd Arif (24), both of whom are charged with violating IPC section 201 (causing the loss of evidence connected to a crime). Rahul Singh, an extra district judge for the special Pocso court, found all four of the defendants guilty. He said, “The court will later rule on the involvement of one juvenile accused who is above 16 years old. The Pocso court also hosted the trial for this young defendant.
He noted that the Juvenile Justice Board is hosting a separate trial for the sixth defendant, who is under the age of 16.
