New Delhi, April 29 (IANS) The mobile phone of the Dec 16 gang-rape victim was recovered from the house of one of the accused, a prosecution witness told the fast track court here trying the case.
“(Accused) Vinay Sharma took out a polythene from a portion of the jhuggi and from this, took out one Nokia mobile phone model 3110. The IMEI of this mobile was checked and tallied with the IMEI number of the victim’s phone,” said a Delhi Police sub inspector who was part of the police team that had accompanied Sharma and other accused Pawan Gupta to their residences for searches.
Deposing as a prosecution witness, the officer added that a pair of leather shoes allegedly belonging to the victim’s male friend was also recovered from Sharma’s home.
During the cross-examination by defence counsel, the officer added that a pair of bloodstained trousers and undergarments allegedly belonging to Gupta were recovered from his home.
“Accused Pawan led the police party to his jhuggi and from this, he took out his clothes which he was wearing at the time of the incident. A ‘Coca Cola’ coloured pant having bloodstains, and one brown underwear having bloodstains were recovered,” he told Additional Sessions Judge Yogesh Khanna.
Apart from the police officer, a photographer, who took photos of the injuries on the victim’s body, also deposed as prosecution witness.
Another person who deposed as a witness in the court was an employee of the hotel whose CCTV cameras had recorded the bus, in which 23-year old woman was gang-raped, as it passed in front of the hotel two times that night.
The photographs as well as the CCTV footage were produced in court and shown to the judge, counsels and witnesses.
Counsel, appearing for the accused Mukesh, Akshay, Sharma and Gupta, however, alleged that the photographs as well as the video were manufactured and tampered with by police, but the witnesses denied the allegations.
The hotel employee who had handed over the CCTV footage to the police denied the allegation, saying the victim’s male friend, who had accompanied police to the hotel on the day after the incident, identified the bus from the footage.
The judge after watching the video said that a white bus appears twice in the footage. However, the defence counsel argued it is not same bus in which the crime had taken place.
The photographer also denied defence lawyers’ allegations that the photos shown in court are different from the ones he had taken at the hospital on Dec 20, 2012, at the request of Delhi Police.
Special Public Prosecutor Dayan Krishnan, meanwhile, told the court that lie detector test, even if volunteered by an accused, is inadmissible as evidence.
Sharma had earlier asked the court that he be allowed for lie detector test to claim himself innocent.
Also, Akshay, who had earlier sought interim bail to go to Bihar’s Aurangabad to meet his mother who is undergoing treatment there, submitted her medical records.
Meanwhile, Mukesh’s counsel told the court his client now does not wish to be moved from Tihar Jail. He earlier requested court to shift him to another jail, saying he faces a threat to his life there.
The 23-year-old woman was brutally tortured and gang-raped in a moving bus Dec 16, 2012, by five men and a juvenile. She later died in a Singapore hospital.
The juvenile is facing proceedings before a Juvenile Justice Board, while the four other accused were put up for trial in the fast track court. One of the accused, Ram Singh, is dead, having allegedly committed suicide in jail.
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