Delhi: Juvenile board reserves order to try minor as adult in Mercedes hit-and-run case

A Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) today reserved its order of trying a teenager, who had allegedly run over a 32-year-old marketing executive while driving his father's Mercedes, as an adult in a trial court.

The Presiding Officer of JJB is likely to pronounce its order on Saturday, on the application filed by Delhi Police seeking transfer of the case to trial court, to try the boy as an adult. The boy turned major just four days after the 4 April incident.

Special Public Prosecutor Atul Shrivastava argued before the JJB that the boy had committed traffic violations earlier also and had "bluffed the court and the police by claiming to be a major".

He said the boy belongs to the age group of 16-18 years, and this offence comes under definition of "heinous crimes" so his trial should be transferred to the trial court.

The Delhi Police, on 26 May chargesheeted the juvenile in the JJB for the offence of culpable homicide not amounting to murder. The offence of culpable homicide not amounting to murder entails a maximum sentence of 10 years jail.

Initially, a case under sections 304 A (causing death by rash or negligent act) of Indian Penal Code (IPC) was lodged against the boy, but later on he was charged for committing culpable homicide not amounting to murder and he was sent to a reform home.

The police in its chargesheet stated that the boy had run over marketing executive Siddharth Sharma with his father's Mercedes, when Sharma was trying to cross a road near Ludlow Castle School in north Delhi on April 4.

The final report was filed for alleged offence under sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), 279 (driving on a public way so rashly or negligently as to endanger human life) and 337 (causing hurt by an act which endangers human life) against him.

The police also annexed the statements of witnesses including that of the youth's friends supporting its case. The police said that the car was being driven at a speed of at least 80 km per hour, when he hit Siddharth Shama. The impact of the car crash threw Sharma several feet into the air and his body landed around 15 metres away from where he stood.

The Police further said, that the youth had been penalised before for violating traffic rules relating to over-speeding, not wearing seat belt and involvement in a minor traffic accident at Maurice Nagar in north Delhi.

The police had earlier arrested a man who claimed to be the actual driver of the Mercedes at the time of the incident, but backed-tracked his statement after he got to know the victim was dead. The driver along with the boy's father, who was also arrested earlier, were granted bail by the court.

The youth had appeared before a Delhi court to surrender and moved a bail plea, which was rejected on the ground that it was a matter of JJB. He was then produced before the board.

-PTI