Manoj Salve, beaten after caught stealing, suffered further assault at police station
The deceased, Manoj Salve
The Mumbai Sessions court on Saturday convicted four policemen of Vanrai Police station in the custodial death case of 2013.
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The deceased, Manoj Salve
The Crime Branch had arrested four policemen — Chandrakant Kamble a resident of Santacruz, Kiran Pingle a resident of Bandra, Umesh Gosavi, a resident of Goregoan and Sandeep Salunke a resident of Jogeshwari — in 2013.
While Judge SM Bhosale sentenced all four to seven years of rigorous imprisonment under Sections 304 (II) (Causing death by negligence), 330 (voluntarily causing hurt to extort confession), 323 (Punishment for voluntarily causing hurt) and 34 (Acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) Indian Penal Code, all the four accused were fined Rs 15,000 each.
According to the prosecutor, on October 26, 2013, Pune resident Manoj Salve alias Aniket Sudhir Khicchi (20), was arrested for stealing a bag from fire-safety equipment expo held at Nesco exhibition grounds in Goregoan (East), along with a friend Prakash Chavan from Solapur.
He died after he was caught and thrashed by a violent mob, and later by the four cops when he was taken into custody. The Crime Branch had registered a murder case under section 302 (murder) of the Indian Penal Code.
“On the basis of the CCTV, we had arrested the four detection police constables of Vanrai police station, for allegedly beating the thief, Manoj Salve, to death,” said an officer of Unit XII of the Crime Branch.
Head injuries
“Salve and Chavan had gone to the ground with the aim of stealing and were caught red-handed by security guards while they were pinching the bag. The CCTV footage captured the cops beating the two accused,” said the officer.
Salve’s post-mortem report showed that he died due to head injuries and multiple contusions on the body.
Last year, according to the Bombay High Court, Maharashtra ranked the highest in custodial deaths. Between 1999 and 2014, around 106 custodial deaths have been registered.