Chandigarh: Teen's revelations shock cops

[ 6 Sep, 2006 0318hrs IST TIMES NEWS NETWORK ]

CHANDIGARH: It's been quite a while that people have stopped calling Chandigarh safe.

But the city, turning increasingly dangerous lately, was still not prepared for what the UT police announced on Tuesday — the rape and murder of a 72-year-old helpless woman by three youths, one of them just 16.

As even those within the department recoiled in horror, the police said the depravity didn't end there. They said there were indications that the youths may have had intercourse with the woman even after she was dead.

Sarla Devi was alone when the trio, all drug addicts, barged into her house on Saturday — she lived alone in her Sector 15 residence — and strangulated her to death with the intention of robbing her.

But three used condoms at the site of the crime indicated that she had also been raped. Members of the Special Investigation Team (SIT), which arrested a drug addict involved in the ghastly crime, a 16-year-old, said his revelations sent a chill down their spine.

The other two are still at large. "One of them first raped her and then they killed her for fear that she may make some noise. And then these perverted youth raped her again," a police officer told ToC.