MUMBAI: The Nagpur bench of the Bombay high court has upheld the death sentence for a 55-year-old man who raped and killed an 11-year-old girl at Amravati in July 2006.
Holding that "the entire conduct of the accused exhibits total depravity which shocks our conscience", justice A P Lavande and Justice A B Chaudhari said that the case fell within the definition of rarest of rare cases and death for the crime was well deserved.
Shankar Khade, a labourer, had raped the girl for several days and his wife Mala helped him in kidnapping her. Mala has been sentenced to five years in jail for aiding the crime. The victim was mentally retarded and lived with her grandmother. Khade and Mala lured her away on July 21, 2007 and kept her at various places, including a temple and at a friend's house, for the next three days.
But fearing that he would be caught, Khade took the girl to a nearby field and strangled her to death on July 24, 2007. The body was found by villagers and cops were informed leading to Khade and Mala's arrest.
A sessions court had sentenced Khade to death in 2007. He appealed to the high court where he pleaded that given his age of 55 years the death sentence was "absolutely unjustified". But on going through the entire evidence the HC found that Khade had also sodomised the victim before killing her.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/HC_upholds_death_for_man_who_raped_killed_11-yr-old/articleshow/3186438.cms
