12 February,2009 04:38 PM IST | | Agencies
In the first of the Nithari case judgments, a special Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court Thursday convicted businessman Moninder Singh Pandher and his domestic help Surendra Koli for raping and killing 14-year-old Rimpa Haldar.
Special judge Rama Jain will pronounce the quantum of punishment Friday morning.
While both Pandher and Koli were found guilty of murder and rape, Koli was also booked under the additional charge of abduction. Pandher was found guilty for destruction of evidence and criminal conspiracy.
The two men were arrested December 29, 2006, after the Noida police found 15 skulls outside the businessman's D-5 bungalow in Noida on the outskirts of the national capital.
Subsequently, more bones were recovered from the drain behind the bungalow. Eventually, investigations revealed that the remains belonged to four women and 15 young girls who had been raped, killed and mutilated.
A total of 19 cases of killings, mainly of girls and women, including Rimpa Halder, were registered at the Noida police station in December 2006 and all the cases were transferred to CBI for investigation.
The skeletal remains were first discovered from a sewer behind Pandher's plush D-5 bungalow in Noida's Sector 31.
The human skulls stuffed in 57 gunny bags containing almost 700 bone pieces were recovered from the drain near Pandher's residence.
Quantum of sentence for the two convicted in the Nithari case to be pronounced on Friday by the Ghaziabad court.
