Man Gets Death Sentence For Raping Toddler Until Organs Came Out

KEY POINTS

The 35-year-old man was sentenced to death Tuesday after being convicted of raping and murdering a 2-year-old girl
Prosecutors argued that the case was the "rarest of rare" and that the man deserved capital punishment
The court asked the government to pay the victim's family Rs 20 lakh (around $26,500) as compensation

An Indian man who was found guilty of raping and murdering a 2-year-old girl has been sentenced to death.

A special Protection of Children Against Sexual Offenses (POCSO) court in Surat in the Indian state of Gujarat handed the sentence to 35-year-old convict Guddu Yadav Tuesday, Indian newspaper The Hindu reported.

The court also asked the state government to pay the victim's family Rs 20 lakh (around $26,500) as compensation.

Yadav, a migrant laborer from Bihar working in a textile factory in Surat, kidnapped and raped the minor victim on Nov. 4, a report by The Times of India said.

He smothered the child to death on the same night and threw the victim's body in the bushes to hide his crime, according to the Ahmedabad Mirror.

Public prosecutor Nayan Sukhadwala told the court that the crime was so barbaric that it caused the girl’s organs to come out of her body.

Yadav was arrested on Nov. 8 after the body of the child, who was the daughter of the convict's fellow migrant workers, was found the day before.

Authorities determined his identity based on footage from over 500 surveillance cameras, as per The Times of India. Additionally, police also performed DNA profiling and a gait analysis, among other tests.

Police filed a 264-page chargesheet against Yadav on Nov. 15.

Prosecutors sought the death sentence for Yadav and urged the court not to show him any leniency.

"The prosecution argued that it is a rarest of rare case where the convict deserves capital punishment," Sukhadwala was quoted as saying.

The POCSO court's judge, P.S. Kala, handed down Yadav's death sentence Tuesday under sections 302 (murder) and 376AB (rape on a woman under 12 years of age) of the Indian Penal Code.

"The judgment will prove a deterrent in preventing such crimes in the future," Sukhadwala said.

The court’s sentence was announced within 21 days of the chargesheet being filed — a feat that Surat's junior home minister Harsh Sanghavi said was "record time."

"[J]ustice has been delivered in such a quick time. It's a historic moment not only for Gujarat, but probably in the country," Sanghavi said.