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A Barishal court has handed down the death penalty to four men for gangraping a housewife in 2016.
Barishal Women and Children Repression Prevention Tribunal Judge Md Rakibul Islam delivered the verdict on Sunday.
The convicts are Russel Gazi, 44, Khokon Khan, 32, Rajib Jamaddar, 34, and Jahid Hawlader, 35.
The court also fined them Tk 100,000 each.
Among the convicts, Khokon remains a fugitive, while the others were in court when the verdict was announced, according to bench assistant Ajibur Rahman.
The incident took place on Nov 10, 2016, in Barishal city’s Dhan Gobeshona Road area, Special Public Prosecutor Abdul Mannan Mridha said, citing the case dossier.
That evening, the victim, aged 19 at the time, had a row with her mother and left home in anger, boarding an autorickshaw to visit her husband at Sher-e-Bangla Medical College Hospital.
However, the driver took her in the wrong direction, towards the Trish Godown Bridge, where she was beaten with a hammer, tied up, and taken to a nearby forest in the Christianpara area.
There, the four convicts and eight to 10 unidentified others gangraped her throughout the night, the prosecutor said. At dawn, they left her unclothed in front of an unknown house.
A man from that house also raped her, according to the case dossier. Later in the morning, some locals found her lying on the ground. Not believing her story, they beat her and left her there, the prosecutor said.
She then found her discarded burqa, put it on, and returned home.
The next day, on Nov 11, 2016, she filed a case against four named suspects and 10 unidentified others.
Police later submitted a charge sheet in November 2017, accusing four people. The judge delivered the verdict after hearing testimonies from 11 witnesses.
The victim’s mother expressed satisfaction with the verdict.