On Thursday Supreme Court (October 19) set aside the conviction and the death sentence of a man accused of kidnapping, raping, and murdering a three-month-old infant after noting that he had not been give a ‘proper opportunity’ to defend himself.
A bench of Justice PS Narasimha, Justice BR Gavai and Prashant Kumar Mishra was hearing an appeal against the judgement which was given by Madhya Pradesh High Court on December 2018 confirming the conviction and sentence of Naveen a 25 year old street dweller. After this on march 2019, a bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi had granted leave to Naveen on its Special Leave Petition and passed the temporary stay on Indore bench’s judgement.
After reserving the judgement today the bench of Justice Gavai pronounced-
“We are of the considered view that the trial court conducted the trial in a hurried manner without giving the accused a proper opportunity to defend himself. Therefore, the judgement of conviction and the sentence passed by the high court is hereby set aside and the matter is remitted to the trail court for de novo trial by according proper opportunity to the appellant to defend himself. The trail court and the district legal service authority, Indore, are directed to provide assistance of a senior counsel to the appellant to contest the trial on his behalf.”
In the case the crime was happened on April 20,2018 and the charge sheet was filled after seven days i.e. on 27th April 2018 in a record time while the Judgement by the trial court was given on 12th May 2018.
Written by- Anmol Kashyap of 5th Semester of City Law College, an Intern under Legal Vidhiya
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