4 to spend life in jail for killing 2 Amboli youths protesting friend’s molestation

Mumbai: A special women's court on Thursday convicted and sentenced four men to life imprisonment for the "heinous" murder of two men who defended their woman friend from sexual attackers outside an Amboli restaurant in 2011. Special judge Vrushali Joshi found the accused Jitendra Rana, 29, Satish Dulaj, 39, Sunil Bodh, 24, and Deepak Piwal, 22, guilty of murder.

They were accused of brutally killing Keenan Santos, 24, and Reuben Fernandez, 29, who had been out for dinner with three women friends, on October 20, 2011. While Keenan died soon after the incident, Reuben died on October 30, 2011, in a hospital in Andheri.

The judge called the crime "a tragic death of two friends who just wanted to enjoy the cricket match on a big screen at Amboli". She refuted the defence arguments that since the deaths occurred in a fit of rage, the offence fell under the charge of culpable homicide amounting to murder. Calling the killing premeditated, the judge said, "There was common intention to commit murder. All of them arranged the weapons to assault and they came back. There is time gap. The anger was there," the judge said.

The court said it was proved from the evidence that Rana and Dhulaj had molested the woman. "They touched her inappropriately and passed lewd comments, touching specific body parts and passing comments like "isko raat ke liye uthake lejayenge", "aur apna toh aaj raat ka aasra hojayega", (this) proves they were in preparation of some grave and heinous offence," the judge said.