BANGLADESH: MAN SENTENCED TO DEATH FOR RAPE AND MURDER OF HIS NIECE IN NATORE

April 24, 2024:

A tribunal has sentenced a man to death over the rape and murder of his niece, a student in 12th grade, in Natore’s Singra Upazila.
The district's Women and Children Repression Prevention Tribunal Judge Muhammad Abdur Rahim delivered the verdict around 11am on April 22, 2024, state counsel Md Anisur Rahman said.
The convict is 35-year-old Md Shahadat Hossain, a resident of Deogachha Uttarpara in Singra.
The judge fined him Tk 20,000 alongside the death sentence.
On Aug 4, 2019, the family of Reshmi Akter, a 16-year-old twelfth grader at Rahmat Iqbal College in Shingra’s Bamihal, went to her father-in-law’s funeral prayer service in the neighbouring village of Deogachha Uttarpara.
Upon returning from school around 3pm, one of her younger brothers found the entrance of the house closed. He forced the door open and found her sister’s hanged body on the second floor of the house, Rahman said, citing the case dossier.
The convict, Hossain, quickly stormed into Reshmi's house when her brother went outside to seek help. Hossain freed Reshmi’s body and tried to flee when the victim’s family arrived and caught him with help from locals.
Hossain later admitted that he had raped Reshmi and strangled her to death. The victim’s mother, Sonabhan Bibi, filed a case with Singra Police Station over the incident, Rahman said.