In Brief
In July 2018, a 10-year-old girl was lured into a man's hut in Dehradun by offering money for sweets. She was raped and murdered by strangulation. The man was convicted by the trial court and his conviction was upheld by the High Court, both imposing the death penalty. The Supreme Court upheld the conviction based on credible witness testimony, the last-seen theory, and DNA evidence. However, it commuted the death sentence to life imprisonment without remission, holding that brutality alone cannot justify capital punishment. The Court emphasized that the 'rarest of rare' test requires courts to examine mitigating circumstances, reformation potential, and the convict's background before imposing death. Here, the lower courts had considered only the crime's brutality without assessing rehabilitation prospects or socio-economic hardships, violating proper sentencing principles.
The lawyer headnote and full judgment text are available to registered users.