Retired cop gets 10 years’ RI in custodial death case

16Jan ’10, Saturday, Staff Reporter , The Hindu

NEW DELHI: Setting aside a lower court judgment, the Delhi High Court on Friday sentenced a retired officer of the Delhi Police to 10 years’ rigorous imprisonment in a custodial death case of Sriniwaspuri here in 1986.

The trial court had acquitted Sub-Inspector Ranveer Singh giving him the benefit of doubt, holding that the victim, Dayal Singh, had died of tuberculosis.

Allowing an appeal against the lower court judgment, a Division Bench of the Court comprising Justice S. K. Kaul and Justice Ajit Bharihoke said acquittal of the accused was an instance of “miscarriage of justice”.

The Bench said the post-mortem report had proved that there were injury marks on the victim’s body. The evidence on record said there was no injury mark on the body when the sub-inspector had picked him up for custodial interrogation in connection with a theft case.

The S-I had used third degree methods to extract a confessional statement from the accused, the Bench observed.

The Bench also imposed a fine of Rs.55,000 on the convict. Of this, Rs.50,000 would be paid to the family of the victim.

The Sriniwaspuri police had picked up the victim from his residence at Govindpuri in South Delhi in the early hours of September 19, 1986. The police had charged him with stealing a VCR, saris and cassettes from the residence of Sumati Jain at Friends Colony in South Delhi. He was working as a guard in the colony. He had died in police custody a day after his detention. The Bench also dismissed a plea by S-I’s counsel to award him a lenient punishment in view of his age and Parkinson’s disease he was suffering from.

http://www.thehindu.com/2010/01/16/stories/2010011657880400.htm