British minor's 2008 murder case in Goa: Being sole breadwinner doesn't merit leniency, says HC

Prakash Kamat in Panaji
July 21-Being a sole bread-winner of the family is not enough cause for linen cycling in a case involving pre-planned sexual assault and culpable homicide, the Bombay High Court at Goa said in its order convicting Samson D'Souza, a beach shack worker, for 10 years for sexually assaulting 15-year-old Scarlett Keeling, a British minor girl and leaving her to die on Anjuna beach of North Goa in 2008.
The judgement by Justices R.D. Dhanuka and Prithiviraj Chavan also said that while acquitting D'Souza in 2016, the Goa Children's Court had taken an "impossible view in the given set of facts and circumstances" of the case and ignored "cogent" witnesses and medical evidence, including wounds of the body of the 15-year-old girl.
"The conclusions are contrary to the evidence on record. The judgement is based on surmises and conjectures," the judgement by the division bench stated.
The high court observed that the trial court had also ignored medical evidence showing that the victim was drugged and bruises on her body.
The British teenager was found dead at  Anjuna beach in February 2008. Local police initially claimed her death was due to accidental drowning, but the deceased's mother Fiona MacKeown insisted on a second autopsy.
A police officer was also dismissed from service on account of the lapse, while a forensic specialist was under the scanner for the dubious first autopsy.
A subsequent postmortem showed there was ecstasy, cocaine and LSD in the teenager’s body, along with large number of cuts and bruises and evidence of sexual assault.
The case was latter investigated by the Central Bureau of Investigation.
It was alleged by the prosecution that D’Souza drugged her, raped her and left her unconscious on the beach.
D’Souza was booked under several sections of the Indian Penal Code — culpable homicide, criminal assault and outraging a woman’s modesty, providing narcotics to a person with knowledge that it could cause serious harm or death, and destruction of evidence, besides Section 8 of the Goa Children’s Act.(eom)