08 December,2020 10:30 AM IST | Mumbai | mid-day online correspondent
Photo for representational purpose
Over six months after a 30-year-old guard at a high-rise in Central Mumbai allegedly molested an eight-year-old girl, police have managed to arrest the man who was on the run since the incident.
As per a report in The Indian Express, according to police, the incident took place on May 28 when the man lifted the girl while she was playing in the verandah and took her inside the pump room, and molested her. Police said soon after the incident, the eight-year-old returned home and informed her mother about the incident, who raised an alarm and went to the police station. When the suspect realised that the woman was going to the police to lodge a complaint, he fled from the spot, an investigator said.
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An officer said, "The accused has been staying in the society premises over the past 12 months. He was employed as a watchman. For extra income, he also did odd jobs in an area nearby."
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Investigators further added that during the course of the investigation, they learnt that the accused had worked there for 12 months and, despite that, nobody from the society knew him personally.
"As none of his relatives stayed in Mumbai, the members of the society should have at least known the name of his native place," said an officer, adding, "these things affected our investigation, due to which we could not trace him earlier."
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Police said they managed to trace those in contact with the suspect.
"We kept inquiring with the locals, who told us that he must have taken a truck to Bhiwandi and is hiding somewhere there. Accordingly, we sent a team but could not locate him," an officer added. The investigators said they later learnt that the accused was in touch with a man working as a garbage truck cleaner in Govandi. Police said they asked the man's friends to get in touch with him, following which the suspect was identified and asked to come near the rickshaw stand at Shivaji Nagar in Mankhurd. "We laid a trap and, as soon as he arrived, we took him into the custody," an officer said.
The accused confessed to the crime during the course of the interrogation, police said. He has been booked under relevant sections of rape in the IPC and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act. He was produced before the court and remanded in police custody, but was again produced and sent to judicial custody. A senior inspector said the arrest was made late last week.
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