Three sentenced to death despite witnesses turning hostile

Hardwar, Mar 14: The first Fast Track Court here has sentenced three people to death for murder despite all the public witnesses turning hostile.

According to police sources, a retired policeman Shiv Kumar Upadhayay and his relative Mithilesh were killed by the latter's son, Sandeep, and his three accomplices' Amit, Jitendra&Dharmendra on August 9, 2003. The two reportedly had illicit relations.

Amit and Sandeep were caught red handed and handed over to the police. The other two accused later surrendered in court.

Additional district counsel Alok Pundir told sources that all the five public eyewitnesses turned hostile and did not identify nay of the accused. The additional district counsel sought conviction of the accused on the basis of the five police eyewitnesses who were cross-examined by the court, apart from the blood stained weapons recovered from the accused and the forensic report of the fingerprints taken from the site of murder.

However, Sandeep is being tried in the district juvenile court as he is a minor.

UNI