Australian prosecutors on Monday demanded life sentence for an accused, who has pleaded guilty to raping and killing an Indian student in 2011 before stuffing her in a suitcase and dumping it in a canal.
Sydney-based Supreme Court on Monday heard that the accused, Daniel Stani-Reginald (21), who lived next door to the victim, had been planning his “cold and calculated” crime well before he raped the 24-year-old.
Crown prosecutor Mark Tedeschi has urged Justice Derek Price to impose a life sentence on Daniel, saying he was capable of seeking notoriety as a serial killer, the AAP news agency reported.
'Deliberate decision'
He said Daniel “made a deliberate decision to school himself on how to become a serial rapist and murderer”.
“In the three months before he raped and strangled [the victim] in the Croydon unit where she lived next door to him, he had viewed about 9,500 disturbing internet articles and websites on serial killers and notorious rapists”, the report said, adding the accused also looked up articles on infamous Australian cases like that of Dean Shillingsworth, the murdered toddler whose body was dumped in a suitcase. He read judgments in the cases of notorious killers and viewed pornography relating to the “degradation of Indian women” on the morning he murdered her, the court heard.
“There’s not the slightest suggestion he was horrified by what he had done,” Mr. Tedeschi said. “The community would be justifiably aggrieved if he were to receive a sentence less than life imprisonment.”
Daniel has pleaded guilty to raping and murdering the girl on March 9, 2011. Her body was discovered by construction workers two days later.
The victim's family is in Australia for the hearing. They told the court about the pain of losing their daughter and sister.
