Five Policemen Held Guilty in 1993 Blasts Case

India — The designated TADA (Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act) court has held five policemen guilty in the 1993 serial blasts case for allowing smooth passage of arms and ammunition from Raigad to Mumbai.

All the five policemen were convicted under s 3(3) of the TADA Act. All of them were found guilty of accepting Rs 7 lakh from another accused, Uttam Potdar, and customs inspector, Gurav, for allowing trucks carrying arms to pass through Ghondgar Phata on 9 January 1993. Explosives, including RDX, had been smuggled from Pakistan and ferried by speedboat to Shekhadi coast in Raigad.

There have been few trials in India’s legal history to match this one. Evidence has been taken from more than 600 witnesses. (Source: www.agranews.com)

Illegal Gold Miners Arrested

Obuasi — Twenty-one persons who allegedly entered level 1,600 feet underground of the George Carpendell Shaft (‘GCS’) belonging to AngloGold Ashanti to illegally prospect for gold have been remanded by a circuit court at Obuasi.

A combined team of security personnel made up of the company’s staff of the Asset Protection Department, the police and the military arrested them while they were in operation. In their possession were a number of sacks filled with gold-bearing rocks, offensive weapons and explosives.

Briefing newsmen minutes after the arrest at the GCS offices, Colonel Steve Oduro-Kwarteng (rtd), Head of the Asset Protection Department of the company said a report was received that the illegal miners had taken over the operations at level 1,600 feet of the GCS. Armed with offensive weapons, they succeeded in chasing the company’s workers out of the area to enable them to have a field day. (Source: www.thisisghana.com)

Paedophile to Hang for Killing Nara Girl

Japan — A repeat sex offender was sentenced to death for the kidnap-murder of a seven-year-old girl in 2004 in a gruesome case in which he had used the victim’s cell phone to send her mother a photo of the corpse and to threaten to kill the 
girl’s sister.

Calling Kaoru Kobayashi’s actions ‘coldblooded and vicious’, presiding Judge Tetsuya Okuda of the Nara District Court ruled he committed all eight criminal counts against him and said, ‘There are no extenuating circumstances.’

Prosecutors sought the gallows for the 37-year-old newspaper deliveryman over the murder of Kaede Ariyama of Nara Prefecture, saying he cannot be rehabilitated.

Kobayashi’s counsel had argued for a lighter sentence, claiming society was partially to blame for his crime because he had had an unfortunate upbringing that turned him into a paedophile.

Kobayashi pleaded guilty. ‘I want to be executed quickly’, he told the court.

Twenty people have received capital punishment for murder-robbery or repeat murders since 1983, when the Supreme Court set conditions for death sentences. However, no one until Kobayashi received it for a single count of murder committed in the act of molestation. (Source: www.japantimes.co.jp)

Teen Advised to File for Bankruptcy

New Zealand — Finance companies should not be loaning money to 16-year-olds to buy cars, an Ashburton judge said.

Judge Chris Somerville had just advised a young man $17,000 in debt to file for bankruptcy so he could not legally be given credit. Then he could not buy a car, run up fines for driving breaches or miss hire purchase obligations.

Brodie Ratu Hemi, 17, was appearing in the Ashburton District Court on a charge of obstructing police who turned up with a bailiff to seize Hemi’s car in lieu of unpaid fines.

He got in the car and tried to drive it away, then smashed its windscreen. Duty solicitor Carlyle Gibson said Hemi’s family was at its wits’ end over the youngster’s behaviour.

He owed $7,000 in unpaid fines, which related to six vehicles, all of which had been seized. Most had been bought on hire purchase agreements with finance institutions, to which he also owed $10,000.

Judge Sommerville said the bankrupt status could be discharged in three years when Hemi had come through this tough patch and sentenced Hemi to six months’ supervision on the obstruction charge. (Source: www.ashburton.co.nz)