(Reproduced from the Times of India January 4, 2008 )
Powai encounter killing: Father demands justice
Swati Deshpande | TNN
Mumbai: Encounter killings by the city police had at one time raised a stink, and exactly 10 years ago a commission of enquiry report by a sitting sessions judge indicted the Mumbai police for “fake encounter deaths.’’ Now, the spotlight is back on the issue that civil libertarians have been condemning as a gross violation of a citizen’s right to life.
Irfan Shaikh, father of 17-year-old Imran, who was killed in a police encounter, has moved the Bombay high court seeking an independent investigation against encounter specialist Vijay Salaskar and his team for the “extra-judicial killing’’ and called for generalised guidelines. The HC is expected to hear the matter on Tuesday.
Imran and another person, an alleged gangster, were shot dead in an encounter last December 14 by a Powai police team headed by Salaskar.
Imran, said his father, was the eldest of six children who studied till Class VII and assisted him with his modest tempo and transport business. On the day of the encounter, Imran washed the tempo and left home in the morning. He left his phone at home and his family assumed he was meeting friends.
However, when he did not show up for two consecutive nights, Irfan asked the Deonar police for help, rang up all his relatives. The police lodged a “missing person’’ report only on December 17 after previous refusal. A day later he was shown a newspaper report about an encounter in Powai and he went back to the police who called up Powai police station which confirmed that two men had been killed.
After identifying his son’s body in a JJ morgue, the father said he was asked to sign on a panchanama stating that his son was carrying firearms and launched an attack on the police who fired back in self defence. “My son has no criminal record,’’ he said emphatically. A right to information query also revealed the across 20 police station in central Mumbai, there was no police record against him.
His petition said, he was repeatedly told by the police not to make an issue about the encounter, just sign and collet the body. He eventually gave in and got his son’s body five days after the encounter. The police and the state is bound by the National Human Rights Commissions guidelines on the procedure to be followed and action to be taken in cases of encounter deaths. Yet there is a rise in such killings, the writ said as it asked for a thorough probe by the CBI in the matter.
Dec 14, 2007: Imran Shaikh (17) killed in a police encounter at Powai
Dec 15: FIR lodged against him for attempted murder and possessing arms
Dec 18: Irfan Shaikh learns about his son’s death
Jan 25, 2008: A RTI query shows that Imran had no past criminal record
Feb 8: Irfan files a complaint with the Powai police station against 15 policemen for killing Imran in a fake encounter
P.L.E.A.D. needs funds, to contribute ...Click here
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TROUBLE BREWS
Frame-up case: Cop withdraws petition
S Ahmed Ali I TNN
Mumbai: The Bombay high court recently said it would dismiss a petition filed by sub-inspector Rajendra Bhosle if he did not withdraw it on his own.Bhosle, who had challenged a couple of affidavits filed by the police finding him guilty of framing an estate agent in a drugs and arms case, then withdrew the petition, paving the way for the M R A Marg police to arrest him.
A division bench asked Bhosle’s advocates to withdraw the petition or face its dismissal. The court also expressed surprise as to how the plea was admitted. Sources, though, said the police would have to wait till March 7, when the sessions court is likely to classify the case of estate agent Rajesh Solanki as bogus.
Solanki’s advocate Rizwan Merchant said, “Bhosle and the accused builder, Ravi Shelatkar, are trying to mislead...and delay the matter. I am worried if the police will be able to pursue the witnesses.’’ The case dates back to 2000 when Shelatkar had floated a redevelopment project in Bhoiwada for which Solanki collected Rs 1.83 crore from businessmen, promising them posh flats.
When the project did not take off, Solanki started demanding his money from Shelatkar. A frustrated Solanki was then called by Shelatkar’s friend, P Sundaram, to his Jogeshwari office on October 19, 2004, promising him to hand over Rs 1.25 crore.
Bhosle, along with eight personnel attached to the Dongri police, allegedly planted a bag containing drugs and a revolver. They also forced Solanki to board a private jeep and took him to the Dongri police station.
Join in At Facebook
"Corruption ... Let's fight NOW"
http://www.facebook.com/When Solanki objected, a revolver was pointed at him and he was also threatened that he would be killed in an encounter. He was taken to the Dongri police station. The next day, Solanki was produced in the Mazgaon case and showed to be in possession of a country-made revolver and 340 gm of brownsugar.
Solanki was remanded in police custody till DCP Naval Bajaj questioned him. Bajaj, believing what was told to him, transferred the case from the Dongri police to their counterparts at M R A Marg. A probe was initiated into Solanki’s allegations. During the inquiry, all but two policemen said they had picked up Solanki from Jogeshwari and not Dongri, as reported by Bhosle. Solanki had been framed by Bhosle, they said.
A couple of departmental inquiries, too, concluded that Bhosle had framed Solanki. Bajaj recommended the dismissal of Bhosle from service—under Article 311 of the Constitution—to former police commissioner A N Roy. But Roy was shifted and successor D N Jadhav reinstated Bhosle last year. ahmed.ali@timesgroup.com-------------------------------------------------------------------------
(Reproduced from the Times of India January 9, 2008 )
2nd autopsy says Brit was murdered in Goa
Preetu Nair | TNN
Panaji: Four persons were detained in Goa late on Saturday after a second autopsy on the body of British teenager Scarlette Eden Keeling confirmed that the 15-year-old was murdered and did not die of drowning as police had claimed.
A panel of three doctors added that though they could not confirm rape, there were strong indications of sexual violence because of injuries in the vagina. The report, which will add to the murkiness of Goa’s tourism sector, urged the sub-divisional magistrate in charge of the case to investigate Scarlette’s death as a homicide. However, the findings of the second autopsy, which came after the girl’s mother, Fiona MacKeown, mounted pressure by refusing to take Scarlette’s body from the government morgue, were not being released to the family. She is determined to file a complaint against the police for cover-up.
Two of the four detained in the case are alleged drug dealers and another is the owner of a cafe, adding fuel to the theories that Scarlette was the victim of a sex and drug ring. Ever since her barely-clad body was recovered from Anjuna beach, her mother has been alleging that multiple bruises on the corpse clearly pointed to rape and murder. But the police ignored her, saying the first autopsy had established death due to drowning.
Scarlett Keeling’s body was found on a Goa beach last month. A second autopsy concluded that 15-year-old Scarlett was murdered.
Doctors say Scarlette Keeling was sexually assaulted as wellGoa minister hits out at cops
Panaji: The confirmation that Briton Scarlette Keeling was murdered has exposed the dark underbelly of Goa’s otherwise picture-postcard touristy life. According to police statistics, of the 25 people held on drug charges in ’06, 15 were foreigners. The number has risen since ’04, when the first numbers are logged.Even as Scarlette’s second autopsy report was presented to a magistrate, the cops held on to the drowning story. “We are conducting the second autopsy because we’re not satisfied with the first,’’ IGP Kishan Kumar said. Worried that bad publicity was hurting the tourism cash cow, Goa tourism minister Francisco X Pacheco demanded strong action against Anjuna police station in charge Nerlon Albuquerque and doctors who had conducted the first autopsy. He said he had apprehended the dubious role of police as it was the same officer and doctors who were involved in the case of an autopsy done on a Goan seaman, Floriono Diniz, who was said to have ended his life. But murder was established after 97 injuries were found on his body.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(Reproduced from the Mumbai Mirror January 11, 2008 )
Scarlett’s mother has no faith in Goa cops
Asks the CBI to investigate her daughter’s death; accuses Goa police of being involved in a ‘cover up’
PANAJI: The mother of a British teenager murdered in Goa on Monday asked for the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to investigate her daughter's death. Fiona Mackeown told BBC Radio 4 that she has asked the chief minister of Goa for a CBI inquiry because she has no faith in the local police, whom she accused of being involved in a “cover up”. “I don’t have any faith,” in the local police, she said, adding, “We don't know how high the corruption goes.” Scarlett Keeling's seminaked body was found on a Goa beach last month. Mackeown forced the Goa police to reopen the case after contradicting their claims that Scarlett was drowned. A second autopsy concluded that 15-year-old Scarlett was murdered.
Fiona Mackeown, Scarlett’s mother
“They (Goa police) may be trying to protect somebody who may have taken money,” she said, adding that people who are running beach shacks or bars are also connected with “heavy duty drug dealers”.
Her comments came after a witness claimed to have seen a barman in a “compromising position” with the victim two hours before her body was found. The Goa police then arrested the barman Samson D’Souza.
The witness, who asked to remain anonymous, told that the attack took place after Scarlett left a bar on Anjuna Beach high on a cocktail of LSD, ecstasy and cocaine at 5 am February 18. Mackeown, however, described reports of her daughter's drug habit as “absolute nonsense”, saying she was a “bright and happy person”.
ACCUSED APPEARS BEFORE COURT
Meanwhile, barman Samson D’Souza appeared in a court in Panaji on Monday and was sent to police custody for 14 days. “D’Souza has been arrested on the grounds that he was seen by a witness in a compromising position with the victim two hours before her body was found,” inspector general of police (IGP) Kishen Kumar said.
“In addition to rape charges, murder charges have also been registered against D'Souza,” Kumar said. IANS
Latest on this site ... http://www.plead.in/latestonsite.htm
Corruption in India,Mumbai,happy,health,Corruption,police,delhi,Bombay,chennai,dubai,constittution,
elderly,corruption,control,bangalore,calcutta,pune,lucknow,change,sessions,court,high court,Supreme court,improve,justice,courts,hafta,chhugani,chugani, Pratibha Patil,Rajnikant,verdict,criminal,
system,senior citizens,Times of India,High Court,Supreme Court of India,judgement,
Harish Shetty,Shilpa Shetty,Bandra,Khar,Brown Sugar,Drugs,Sindhi,Xavier College,Stephrns College,Starplus,Jethmalani,memon,Dawood,BharatShah,Barkha,ndtv,Bribes,Infosys,Cnn,Aajtak,Zee,Gandhi, Sabharwal,Jessica Lal
