Page 7 - Rape Cases

NY's top court appears torn on tossing Weinstein's 2020 rape conviction

Nearly four years after Harvey Weinstein was convicted of rape and sent to prison, New York's highest court appeared torn at oral arguments Wednesday about potentially overturning the landmark #MeToo-era verdict. Weinstein's lawyers urged the state's Court of Appeals to dismiss the disgraced movie mogul's 2020 conviction, arguing that the trial judge, James Burke, trampled his right to a fair trial with pro-prosecution rulings that turned the trial into 1-800-GET-HARVEY. It was his character that was on trial. It wasn't the evidence that was on trial, Weinstein's lawyer Arthur Aidala told the seven-member court in Albany. Weinstein, 71, was convicted of a criminal sex act for forcibly performing oral sex on a TV and film production assistant in 2006 and rape in the third degree for an attack on an aspiring actress in 2013. He was sentenced to 23 years in prison. Last year, he was convicted in Los Angeles of another rape and sentenced to an additional 16 years in prison. A lawyer fo

BJP glorifying perpetrators of rape, turning Kashi into mall: UP Cong chief

The Congress' Uttar Pradesh unit chief Ajay Rai has accused the BJP government in Uttar Pradesh of "glorifying" perpetrators of rape and also turning Kashi into a shopping mall. Interacting with reporters at Mahadeva Mela here on Sunday, he said the BJP MLA from Duddhi was already facing trial for rape under the POCSO Act when his party gave the ticket to fight the polls and become a legislator. "This shows the BJP's thinking towards women. The perpetrators of rape are being glorified in the BJP government. The victim got justice from the court," the UP Congress chief said. An MP-MLA court of Sonbhadra on Friday sentenced BJP MLA from Duddhi assembly constituency Ramdular Gond to 25 years of rigorous imprisonment for raping a girl nine years ago. The court also imposed a fine of Rs 10 lakh which will help in the victim's rehabilitation. Rai, who along with Congress office-bearers attended the closing ceremony of the Mahadeva Mela and performed Jalabhishek at Lodheshwar Mahadev ...

JSW chief Sajjan Jindal denies allegations of rape, calls them 'baseless'

Media reports said Jindal was accused of rape in a report filed at Mumbai's Bandra Kurla Complex Police Station

Ujjain rape horror: No arrests made in 15-year-old girl's rape case

A priest contacted the police after he found the girl bleeding and half-naked on the street; no arrest has been made so far

Sri Lankan cricketer found 'not guilty' of rape in Australian court case

Sri Lankan cricket international Danushka Gunathilaka has been found not guilty of raping a woman he met on a dating site during the south Asian team's tour of Australia last November. Judge Sarah Huggett acquitted the 32-year-old player as he sat at Sydney's Downing Centre District Court on Thursday listening to the decision. Huggett found that the alleged victim, who cannot be legally named, was an intelligent witness who did not deliberately give false evidence about the use of a condom but was motivated by a desire to paint the cricketer in an unfavorable light. I find that the evidence regarding the complaint far from supports the complainant. Rather it undermines the reliability of her evidence, she said. Gunathilaka and the woman met for drinks at a bar before having pizza together in downtown Sydney and catching a ferry to the woman's home in the city's eastern suburbs. The woman accused him of various acts of aggression and violence. Police initially brought four charges

Supreme Court bench to start hearing pleas on marital rape in mid-October

The Supreme Court on Friday said it would list pleas on the issue of marital rape for hearing in mid-October. The pleas raise the legal question of whether a husband enjoys immunity from prosecution for the offence of rape if he forces his wife, who is not a minor, to have sex. A bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandarchud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra took note of the submissions of lawyer Karuna Nundy that the pleas needed to be heard. We are in midst of constitution bench hearings. We can list this after the constitution bench matters are wrapped up, the bench said and asked Solicitor General Tushar Mehta and other lawyers how much time they would take in advancing their arguments. I will take two days. This (issue) has social ramifications, the law officer said. A counsel for the petitioners said they would like to argue for three days. Then it can be listed for hearing in April next year! the CJI quipped and later said the pleas would be listed for hearing in .

Youth held in UP's Ballia for abducting, raping a 14-year-old girl

A 14-year-old girl was allegedly abducted and raped in a village here, police said on Saturday. The girl was allegedly abducted by 22-year-old Javed Khan alias Raja on May 25, they said. After he could not find her, the girl's father on Friday filed a complaint against Khan, accusing him of kidnapping, SHO Rajesh Mishra said. The same day police traced the girl, who in her testimony said Khan raped her and threatened to kill her, Mishra said. Javed Khan was arrested from Ghorhara village on Saturday morning and booked under several sections of IPC as well as under the POCSO Act, the SHO added.

Re-examine rape complaint against Vijayvargiya, others: SC tells court

The Supreme Court directed a judicial magistrate to re-examine a rape complaint filed by a woman against senior BJP leaders Kailash Vijayvargiya, Pradeep Joshi, and Jishnu Basu, in West Bengal in 2018

Harvey Weinstein found guilty of rape, sexual assault in Los Angeles trial

After a month-long trial and nine days of deliberations, Los Angeles jurors on Monday found Harvey Weinstein guilty of the rape and sexual assault of just one of the four accusers he was charged with abusing. But the three guilty counts involving an Italian actor and model known at the trial as Jane Doe 1 still struck a major blow against the disgraced movie mogul, and provided another #MeToo moment of reckoning, five years after he became a magnet for the movement. Weinstein, who is two years into a 23-year sentence for a rape and sexual assault conviction in New York that is under appeal, could get up to 24 years in prison in California when he's sentenced. He was found guilty of rape, forced oral copulation and another sexual misconduct count involving the woman who said he appeared uninvited at her hotel room door during a Los Angeles film festival in 2013. Harvey Weinstein forever destroyed a part of me that night in 2013 and I will never get that back. The criminal trial was

Kerala court sentences man to cumulative 48-year jail term for raping minor

A Kerala fast track court on Monday sentenced a 25-year-old man to a cumulative total of 48 years of imprisonment for raping his minor niece in 2015 at his residence in Munnar in the high range district of Idukki. The Idukki Fast Track Court sentenced the man to varying quantum of punishment, the highest of which was 10 years, to a total of 48 years for the offences of rape, molestation and sexual assault under the Indian Penal Code and Protection Of Children from Sexual Offenses (POCSO) Act and crimes under the Juvenile Justice Act. The court also imposed a fine of Rs 40,000 on the convict and directed the District Legal Services Authority to pay Rs 50,000 to the victim for her rehabilitation, Special Public Prosecutor (SPP) Shijo Mon Joseph, who appeared for the state in the matter, said. As the sentences have to be served concurrently and the highest of the jail terms was 10 years, the man would serve only 10 years behind bars, the SPP said. The offences were committed before ..

Lakhimpur Kheri rape case: Police mull slapping stringent NSA on 6 accused

The Uttar Pradesh Police is mulling over slapping the stringent National Security Act against the six people arrested for the rape and murder of two Dalit sisters in the state's Lakhimpur Kheri. The sisters, aged 15 and 17, were found hanging from a tree in a sugarcane field on Wednesday evening. The National Security Act (NSA) allows the detention of people up to one year without any charge. "We are mulling to impose the NSA on the six accused persons. Apart from this, DNA samples of the six accused persons and the two girls will also be sent for an examination," Superintendent of Police Sanjiv Suman told PTI on Friday. Suman said none of the accused is minor, dismissing reports of the kin of some of them making the claiming. Meanwhile, Assistant District Government Counsel Brijesh Pandey said the accused were produced before a POCSO court, which sent them to a 14-day judicial custody. District Magistrate Mahendra Bahadur Singh on Friday told reporters that the monetary relief o

10 yrs after Nirbhaya case, Delhi still most unsafe; are policies failing?

Delhi has a unique situation where the police report to the central government rather than the state government

Victim knows the offender in over 95 per cent rape cases in India: Report

A total of 65,025 such cases were reported in 2021, and 96.8 per cent of the victims in these cases knew the rapist beforehand, the NCRB report revealed

Delhi most unsafe for women, 2 minors raped every day last year: NCRB data

Two minor girls were raped every day last year in the national capital, which was the most unsafe metropolitan city for women across the country, according to the latest report of NCRB. Delhi also recorded 13,892 cases of crimes against women in 2021, a significant surge of more than 40% compared to 2020 when the figure was 9,782, the data showed. The cases of crimes against women in Delhi accounted for 32.20 per cent of total crimes in the category among all 19 metropolitan cities, according to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data. Delhi was followed by the financial capital Mumbai, which saw 5,543 such instances, and Bengaluru with 3,127 cases. Mumbai and Bengaluru accounted for 12.76 per cent and 7.2 per cent of total crimes in 19 cities, respectively. The national capital has also reported the highest number of cases of crimes against women in the categories related to kidnapping (3948), cruelty by husbands (4674) and girl child rapes (833) as compared to other ...

POCSO court gives 20 years imprisonment to man for raping 13-year-old girl

A Special POCSO Court in Odisha's Balasore district sentenced a man to 20 years of rigorous imprisonment for raping a 13-year-old girl. POCSO Court Judge, Balasore, Ranjan Kumar Sutar on Saturday convicted Dinesh Marandi (22) of village Panpana under the Khantapara police station for sexually assaulting the girl of same village on January 15, 2021. The girl's mother had lodged an FIR with police against Dinesh. He was arrested and tried under different Sections of the POCSO Act. "The court awarded different jail terms for different sections of IPC under which the accused was tried, which would run concurrently and penalties for different sections aggregating to 20 years of rigorous imprisonment and Rs 10,000-fine. Twelve witnesses were examined and 18 documents were exhibited, said Special Public Prosecutor, POCSO, Pranab Panda. The court also directed the government to pay Rs 4 lakh as compensation from the child welfare fund to the victim.

"Shift blame to flawed Indian system": How Uber reacted to 2014 rape case

When an Uber cab driver raped a 25-year-old passenger in Delhi in 2014, the company's first response was to "shift blame to flawed Indian background checks"

'Are you promoting rapes?' BJP MP questions silence of Telangana ministers

After as many as five rape cases involving minors were reported within a week in Hyderabad, BJP MP Arvind Dharmapuri on Wednesday questioned the "silence" of CM KCR and Minister KT Rama Rao

NCW takes cognisance of 5 rape cases in Hyderabad involving minor girls

The Commission has taken serious note of the increasing rate of heinous crimes against girls and women in the Hyderabad district of Telangana.

Marital rape exception egregiously problematic, says Justice Shakdher

Justice Shakdher asserted that the fact that the rapist is the husband of the victim does not make the act of sexual assault any less injurious

WB CM Mamata Banerjee pulls up Bengal police for violence, rape cases

Facing criticism for the incidents, she pulled up senior police officers saying that their sources have failed in providing them with inputs leading to such incidents in Birbhum and Nadia district