Telangana: In a first, life in jail for 19-yr-old who committed murder as minor

Hyderabad: For the first time in the country, a court here on Thursday sentenced a 19-year-old man to rigorous life imprisonment for having unnatural sex with a minor boy and murdering him two years ago as a juvenile.

Additional Metropolitan Sessions Judge Suneetha Kunchala found "the child in conflict with the law" and guilty of the charges. He was 17 years old at the time of commission of the crime.

The Telangana Police, in a press release, said it is the first time in the country that an accused, who was a juvenile at the time of the crime, has been sentenced to life imprisonment for the offences of unnatural sex and murder.

He was convicted under sections 364 (kidnap in order to murder), 377 (unnatural offences), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence), 302 (murder) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and relevant sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act.

The court also imposed a fine of Rs 5,000 on the man on different counts.

Additional public prosecutor K Pratap Reddy said the court sentenced the man to 10 years rigorous imprisonment each under IPC sections 364 and 377, seven years under section 201 and rigorous life imprisonment under section 302.

The sentences will run concurrently.

According to the prosecution, the accused had on June 28, 2017, taken the 11-year-old victim to the terrace of a government boys’ school building on the pretext of playing with him.

The man had unnatural sex with the boy before killing him by hitting him on the head with an iron pipe. He hid the victim's body for eight days, the release said.

As per the Juvenile Justice Act, a child in conflict with law is a child who is alleged or found to have committed an offence and who has not completed 18 years of age on the day of the commission of such offence.