Accused teens undergo voice analysis

Mumbai: “Apni beti wapas chahiye toh ek crore ka intezaam kar”; “Paise leke Kalwa aaja”; “Tunnel aayega tab paise ka bag fek de”. These are some of the sentences two teenagers arrested for kidnapping and murdering a three-and-a-half-year-old were made to repeat as part of a voice analysis test. The state forensic laboratory that conducted the test will compare these recordings with previous ransom call recordings obtained from the deceased’s father and analyse them to see if they match.

The J.J. Marg police station earlier this year applied to the juvenile justice court asking them for permission to conduct a voice analysis test of the two accused, aged 16 and 17, who were arrested for the kidnapping and murder of three-and-a-half year old Junera Khan.

On December 5, the victim was kidnapped from outside her house allegedly by the 16-year-old accused, who happens to be her neighbour, and who hatched the plan with his friend. Hours after kidnapping her, the accused strangled her and stuffed her body in a rexin bag, hiding it behind a water tank of an adjoining building. Shockingly, the accused continued helping in the search for the girl initiated by her family and police. After realising that the police wasn’t suspecting them, they started making ransom calls to Junera’s father on December 19. The father recorded these ransom calls on his cell phone.

“He had an audio recorder installed on his phone and all calls got automatically recorded. Since we had this audio, to make our case more foolproof, we decided to conduct a voice analysis test of the accused to ascertain that they had made the calls,” said a senior officer from J.J. Marg police station.

After being granted permission, experts from the forensic state laboratory met the two teenagers, who are presently at Dongri Children’s Home. “They made them repeat key sentences from the recording, including the demand for ransom and the directions given by them to the victim’s father on how to hand over the ransom amount,” the officer said.

According to another police source, the accused were asked to say, “Apni beti wapas chahiye toh ek crore ka intezaam kar.” Experts will later analyse the recordings to ascertain if the calls were made by the two teenagers, he said.