Baripada: The special POCSO court here convicted Jaminikant Mohanta in the rape and murder of a minor girl and handed him the death sentence, Wednesday.
Additional district sessions judge (1) and judge of the special POCSO court Mohammed Irshadun Nabi handed the death penalty to Jaminikant after convicting him under POCSO Act and Section 302 (murder) of IPC. He also imposed a penalty of Rs 1,00,000 lakh on the convict.
The incident had taken place in Betanoti area June 15, 2018. Jaminikant had lured the eight-year old girl to accompany him on his bike to a village fair. However, Jaminikant instead of taking her to the fair, forced her to go to the Garudabasa forest where he raped her and then strangulated the girl to death. Then he returned home alone and kept quiet about the entire incident.
The victim’s family meanwhile started searching for the girl. Some of the villagers informed girl’s family members that they had seen Jaminikant carrying the girl on his bike. Finally after a frantic search, the girl’s body was recovered from the forest where she had been raped and murdered.
The family members of the victim lodged a complaint at the Betanoti police station. Police later arrested Jaminikant and charged him with kidnap, rape and murder of the girl.
The court delivered the verdict after examining 27 witnesses and other evidences during the trial. This is the first death penalty under POCSO Act at Baripada Court, special public prosecutor Avinna Patnaik said.
PNN