TEAM HERALD
bureau@herald-goa.com
VASCO: Did the police err in releasing two different sketches of the prime accused in the Vasco school sexual assault case or were there, in fact, two accused on the day of the incident?
While the police have refused to admit any differences in the two sketches, a school employee has now suggested that while one person had been caught loitering in the school premises, the other person could have sexually assaulted the schoolgirl in the school toilet on the same day.
The possibility that there may have been two different persons first surfaced when police released two seemingly different sketches of the accused.
Goa police had released a first sketch on January 15 and then released a second sketch on January 16, visibly different from the first one. While the first sketch was a clean shaven person with curly hair, the second sketch had shown the accused with a French beard and earrings.
It was initially assumed that the two sketches had represented only one accused, allegedly sighted by the school staff and headmistress, while loitering in the school premises, before he was alleged to have sexually assaulted the victim.
In fact, the police had even refused to admit that there are any differences in the two sketches. “The fresh sketch is based on combined inputs from the victim and witnesses,” Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIG) O P Mishra had earlier told Herald, when asked about the difference in the two sketches released on the two subsequent days by the police.
“The sketches match with each other, though not completely. Inputs from teachers, headmistress, security guard and other witnesses were clubbed together this time,” said an officer, among the 15-member team investigating the case, on condition of anonymity.
There is now a strong possibility that one sketch could have resembled a person caught loitering in the school, while the other sketch resembled the accused who had hid in the girl’s toilet and had sexually assaulted the schoolgirl.
This view has been strengthened by the disclosure of an employee of the Vasco School. “During recess at about 10.45 am on January 14, one teacher found a person loitering in the school corridor on the first floor. When the teacher asked him to justify his presence in the school, the person merely replied in Hindi, ‘Monty se milna hai’ (I want to meet Monty),” said the employee.
“The teacher then took the person to the headmistress, who also had asked him to explain his visit to the school. While the headmistress was questioning him, the person kept typing something on his mobile phone. He avoided the questions and kept using his phone. As he was not responsive, the headmistress had asked him to leave the premises and had warned him not to return to the school.”
“It now appears that the person who was found loitering in the school could have been different from the person who sexually assaulted the schoolgirl, as is being depicted by two different sketches. It could be that this accomplice was trying to alert the accused ‘Monty’ that he had been confronted by the school staff,” the employee added.
That the accused could have been accompanied by an accomplice on January 14 cannot be ruled out, especially since the victim had told her father that when the accused had met her on the fourth occasion on January 10, he had been accompanied by “another man carrying a guitar.”
