Last Seen Theory Must Be Proximate With Time Of Death: Bombay High Court Acquits Two Accused Of Murdering Deranged Man Mistaking Him For Demon
Case: Gautam Kamlakar Pardeshi and anr v The State of Maharashtra
Coram: Justices Sadhana Jadhav and Milind Jadhav
Case No.: Criminal Appeal No. 224 Of 2018
Court Observation: “Unless there is proximity in the time of last seen and the time of death, the evidence cannot be taken into consideration to convict the accused.”
“Then under the pretext of giving food to the said person, Pravin, Gautam and Rahul led him to pump house and started assaulting him. The accused then denuded the said person of his clothes,”
“The prosecution has failed to establish that P.W. 8 and P.W.9 had seen the deceased in the company of the accused. The only description is that he was a mentally ill person. But the identity of the person as the deceased Talwalkar has not been established. The statement of P.W. 8 and P.W. 9 are recorded after the arrest of the accused. Therefore, again there is no material to show that it was on the basis of their statement that the accused were arrested,”
“Last seen theory” by itself is not sufficient to prove that the accused are the authors of the fatal injuries sustained by the deceased. In fact, the prosecution has to establish the time when the deceased was lastly seen in the company of the accused and the time of death.”
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