The Central Bureau of Investigation has found concrete evidence to prove that the accused in the Pollachi sexual abuse case raped young women and videographed it to intimidate and harass the victims.
A special team of the Special Crimes Branch, Chennai, on Friday filed the first chargesheet in the court of the Chief Judicial Magistrate in Coimbatore against five suspects — A Sabarirajan alias Rishwanth (26), Thirunavukkarasu (28), M Satheesh (29), T Vasanth Kumar (24) and R Mani alias Manivannan (26) of Pollachi — on charges of rape, harassment, criminal intimidation, criminal conspiracy and others.
“Our investigation has disclosed that an organised gang operated with a common intention to entice young girls for the purpose of sexually harassing and committing rape on them. The process of harassment and rape was invariably videographed by another member of the gang. Then the victims were threatened that the obscene videos will be uploaded on social media or put out in public domain. The victims were warned not to inform their parents or local police about the incidents,” a CBI officer told The Hindu on Friday.
Obscene video
He said the complainant in the first case was threatened that the obscene video involving her would be exposed if she informed her family or police.
“We have established technical, material and other circumstantial evidence to prove the involvement of the five accused persons. They were all telephonically connected before and after the commission of the offence. They are all liable for sexual assault and rape...,” the officer said.
The five suspects against whom the chargesheet was filed on Friday were already arrested and remanded in judicial custody. Efforts were on to identify other accused persons in the case.
On the identity of the person who videographed the crime, the officer said the victim or victims had identified all the accused persons and more arrests would follow.
“We are in the process of identifying other suspects in the case based on the information shared by the victims and others already arrested in the case,” the officer added.
In April, the CBI registered two cases and took over the investigation in the case from the Crime Branch CID of the Tamil Nadu police, which had arrested the suspects and examined some victims who identified them. Besides seizing mobile phones and storage devices that containing incriminating evidence, investigators examined a number of witnesses, police sources added.
