Koli confession clinched case

NEW DELHI: The girl eater of Nithari, 38-year-old Surinder Koli, was the one CBI had singled out from the very beginning of its probe into the Nithari killings. It first sent his name for trial and then on Thursday demanded the death sentence for him.
The agency succeeded on both counts because it drew special judge Rama Jain's attention to the fact that Koli wasn't an ordinary criminal but a pervert who was "necrophilic (commits sexual acts on a corpse), paedophilic (sex with minors) and paraphiliac (a pyscho sexual disorder).''
The judge had no hesitation in putting Koli's crime in the "rarest of rare category'' to direct that he be hanged till death.
It was Koli's confessional statement to a magistrate that brought about the conviction for both, a fact that the judge readily admitted in her verdict. In the absence of an eyewitness testimony, the case hinged entirely on circumstantial evidence and the prosecution bolstered its case by producing on record Koli's admission before a judicial officer.
In his statement, the servant narrated how his master's lifestyle brought out his animal instincts and made him kill young girls, dismember their bodies and even eat them.
In fact, Koli's U-turn during trial when he disowned his 164 CrPc statement didn't help him much as judge Jain gave full marks to the magistrate for recording Koli's testimony only after he showed his willingness.
Though the CBI also based its case on scientific tests like DNA fingerprinting, brain mapping and skull superimposition of the convicts, the court didn't give much credence to these, saying these were tools for a probe and not to base a verdict upon.
The court had on Wednesday convicted Pandher and Koli under various sections of the Indian Penal Code for murder, rape, criminal conspiracy and destruction of evidence. In the final arguments this morning, the CBI had sought death penalty for Koli and left the quantum of punishment for Pandher to the court to decide as the agency had no charges against him.
During the half-hour long arguments, the agency's counsel argued that Koli has no right to live in society because even today he has no remorse for his deeds. "He continues to be a threat to society,'' said the counsel.
CBI maintained it was only Koli who used to lure innocent women and children to the house of his employer before killing them and later having sex with their bodies. In some cases, he used to cook and eat their flesh, the counsel said.
But the agency's harping on Koli also elicited strong criticism from victim's lawyer Khaled Khan who alleged CBI was trying to shield Pandher, pointing out how he had been excluded from the chargesheet. A saw recovered at Pandher's instance was never medically examined by the CBI, nor was his 164 statement recorded.