13-Year-Old Pummels 6-Year-Old To Death After Failed Attempt To Rape Her: Police

A 13-year-old boy in India allegedly killed a 6-year-old girl by repeatedly hitting her on the head using a brick after she resisted his attempts to rape her, authorities said.

Police said that as the girl bled due to her injuries, the boy went to a nearby tube-well to wash his hands, changed his stained shirt and headed to school, The Times of India (TOI) reported.

The girl, who reportedly disappeared while playing with her friends on Saturday morning, was found severely injured behind some bushes in the backyard of her house in a Modinagar village.

Her parents rushed her to a nearby hospital, where she was declared dead on arrival.

"A villager called to inform us about a young girl lying injured at the backyard of her house. By the time we reached there, her family had taken her to the hospital. She had succumbed to her injuries before being wheeled into the emergency ward. Initial investigation revealed that her face and head had been smashed with a blunt object, possibly with a brick or stone," deputy commissioner of police Ravi Kumar was quoted as saying by TOI.

Some children from the neighborhood who were playing with the girl Saturday morning told police that they thought she had returned home when she went missing.

After the girl's parents filed a complaint, a murder case was initiated against unknown people.

The police immediately investigated the incident, forming seven small teams for the case. While one team collected evidence from the spot, another scanned CCTV footage of the nearby areas and a third team spoke to teachers and students of the school where the girl was enrolled. One team talked to the parents, and another questioned and interviewed children of the village. A sixth group investigated the area around the murder spot with the dog squad, and the seventh team made a list of suspects.

The girl's father told police that his daughter had gone out to play at around 10 a.m. that day.

"An hour later, my wife started looking for her as it was time to take a bath. She searched the locality, but couldn't find her. After some time, a neighbor told us that our daughter lay injured in the backyard of our house, where we keep the cattle. We rushed there and found her oozing blood from the wounds in her head. We took her to a hospital, but she had died by then," he said.

During questioning, one of the villagers told police he had seen the boy washing his hands in the tube-well near the area where the girl was discovered.

Police said the boy admitted to the crime when he was questioned by officers.

"This was also around the time when the girl was reported missing. We detained the boy for questioning. After a few questions, he broke down and admitted to the crime," the deputy commissioner of police said. "He had seen the girl alone and dragged her into the bushes. He tried to rape her, and when she resisted, he hit her with a brick."

The victim's identity was not disclosed to the public to protect her privacy as per the country's Supreme Court's directives on cases related to sexual assault.