In a bid to build a water-tight case, the city Crime Branch sleuths on Wednesday took the five arrested accused to Shakti Mill compound at Mahalaxmi in south-central Mumbai, where they allegedly gang-raped a photojournalist on August 22, and reconstructed the chain of events leading the shocking crime.
During the exercise involving the reconstruction of the crime scene that lasted for nearly two hours, the five accused were made to enact the entire sequence of events — from the time they landed on the scene, the manner in which they led the unsuspecting victim girl and her male colleague to the defunct and deserted compound, where they allegedly committed the crime and the route they used to escape after the incident. The entire exercise was video-graphed.
While Mumbai’s Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Himanshu Roy supervised the exercise, officers and men of the Mumbai Police, Crime Branch-CID and forensic experts from Mumbai, New Delhi and Gandhinagar were present on the occasion.
Talking to mediapersons later, Roy said: “This is a significant exercise undertaken to build a water-tight case. During this exercise, we corroborate details like: How the accused came on the scene, the nature of the conversation that took place, how they committed the offence and how they left the scene after committing the crime. The exercise is aimed at creating a time-line and chain of events leading to the crime. This will help us make our case strong.”
“We took the accused to the spot where they demonstrated to us as to how the crime was perpetrated. We got more clarity and better understanding of what happened. We are confident of building a strong case and determined to take it to the logical end,” Roy said.
“The accused in this case have committed a heinous crime. It is our effort to ensure that justice is delivered and delivered fast,” Roy said.
Roy said that the investigators had recovered an odhani (stole), which did not belong to the victim, from the spot. Given that the accused had used the stole to wipe themselves after perpetrating the crime, the DNA samples from that piece of the cloth would be matched with those of the accused.
The police had on Tuesday seized clothes, including undergarments, worn by the suspects at the time of the incident during searches at their homes.
On Tuesday, forensic experts from the Central Forensic Science laboratory of the CBI and Gandhinagar Forensic laboratory visited the mill compound — in a bid to marshal more scientific evidence. In initial stages, the samples from the site had been collected by the experts from the Kalina Forensic laboratory and Mumbai Police.
The DNA samples obtained from the accused by a team of doctors from the State-run JJ Hospital will be matched with the forensic samples taken from the crime scene and the rape survivor’s vaginal swabs.
In addition to the regular forensic tests, the city crime branch sleuths have also enlisted the help of the forensic experts from Gujarat to carry out a new scientific technique called layered Voice Analysis (lVA) of the arrested accused.
Among other things, the lVA identifies the criminal’s state-of-mind by analysing key vocal properties in the speech, various types of stress, cognitive processes and emotional reactions and detects deceptive motivation, criminal intention, and general credibility by identifying key emotional signatures reflected in the voice.
The lVA not only detects deception and truthfulness, but it also discerns inaccuracies, high stress, high-thinking level, high excitement, and overall psychological state of the subject being interviewed.
Rape Survivor fine, discharged
Mumbai: After her recuperation, the gang-rape survivor — a photojournalist working a city magazine — was discharged from the Jaslok Hospital on Tuesday evening.
“The patient had improved steadily and our team of doctors especially assigned for the patient had declared the patient medically fit for discharge on Tuesday evening and hence she was discharged late on Tuesday night. The patient has been explained all future steps to ensure that she stays medically fit and healthy,” Dr Tarang Gianchandani, acting CEO and director-medical services of the hospital, said in a statement issued here on Wednesday.
She said the hospital management was “immensely grateful” to Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan for his support during this situation from all aspects to the hospital, which “enabled us to focus on patient’s care”.
“The hospital had considered waiving the expenses for the patient, however, the State has graciously taken it up, for which we respect them,” Dr Gianchandani said. She also thanked the Mumbai Police, Central, State authorities and media for their co-operation.