14 villagers acquitted in 2002 dacoity case in Thane

Thane: Fourteen villagers from Bhiwandi taluka were acquitted by a local court in a 2002 dacoity case for want of sufficient evidence against them. Letting off all the 14 accused hailing from separate villages, District Judge AS Bhaisare said the prosecution had miserably failed to prove the case against them.

There were a total of 17 accused in the case but during the pendency of the trial, three of them died, the court was informed. According to the prosecution, on April 29, 2002 at about 4 AM the accused reached the company at Kudus of Wada taluka and held the security guards captive in the bathroom after beating them up following which they committed the dacoity and decamped with Rs 8,000 cash.

In his order on April 5, the judge said there was no identification parade. Also, the accused were not identified by the prosecution witnesses. According to prosecution witnesses, only four persons had been to the spot. However, about 17 persons are made accused in the case. There is no evidence of fingerprint expert who could have thrown the light on the matter, it said.

The judge noted that "having considered facts and circumstances of the matter, evidence on record and discussed reasons, in my view, prosecution miserably failed to prove the alleged offence against the accused persons".