On Friday, the SC acquitted a man sentenced to death by a Gujarat trial court. The sentence was upheld by HC. Both courts had based the conviction on his statement before a magistrate to the effect that he raped and killed a minor girl.
A Bench comprising Justices S B Sinha and Markandey Katju felt uncomfortable about the man being convicted solely on the basis of the confessional statement and that too when they had serious doubts whether it was made voluntarily or not.
The accused Babubhai Udesinh Parmar confessed before the police four years after the girl was found raped and strangulated in a field at Karamshad town in Gujarat.
Parmar, a history sheeter, was taken to the magistrate for recording of his confessional statement. As he was involved in many other crimes, he also gave another confessional statement, recorded by the same magistrate.
The recording of two confessions in close proximity by the same magistrate gave rise to the doubts in the minds of the SC judges.
Justice Sinha, writing the judgment for the Bench, said: "It is a matter of some concern that the magistrate started recording the confession of the appellant in the second case soon after the first one. Both the cases involved serious offences. They resulted in the extreme penalty."
Referring to the trial court proceedings, the Bench said the judge gave an impression that he had proceeded on the basis that the appellant is guilty of commission of crime in a large number of cases.
"The purported corroborative evidence brought on record by the prosecution and as noticed by the HC did not indicate that the appellant was guilty of commission of the offence,"it said.
The apex court then set aside the judgments of the trial court and the high court and set the appellant free.
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Tags : Criminal Law
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