Delhi ‘serial rapist’ assaulted girls on rooftops, threatened to throw them
Delhi ‘serial rapist’ Sunil Rastogi has six cases of molestation and rape of minors registered against him in Delhi and Rudrapur in Uttarakhand. Three women allegedly raped by Rastogi when they were minors identified him as their assaulter but refused to file a complaint fearing social boycott
Alleged paedophile Sunil Rastogi reportedly took the girls to dingy rooms on rooftops, asked them to try out new clothes before him and when they refused, he threatened to throw them from the building and cripple them for life, three women who were allegedly assaulted by him have told Delhi Police.
The women, who were minors when they were assaulted in 2006, have said that they did not approach the police back then because they feared for their families and their own lives.
The other two minors who were allegedly assaulted by Rastogi on January 12 have told the police that he tried to confine them in a dark room and touched them inappropriately. They, however, ran away and sought help from a passerby. He even allegedly tried to gag them and intimidated them by his laughter.
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“Rastogi always chose locations that were less frequented by people. He mostly picked abandoned houses, old buildings, under-construction houses and that too in New Ashok Nagar. When he did not find such locations, he took the girls to buildings where bachelors, mostly students, resided. Since he operated during the afternoon, none of the residents used to be around and he would escape each time,” an investigator explained.
Rastogi, who lived in Delhi till 2004, police said, was first arrested for allegedly sexually abusing a girl in 2006 at Rudrapur in Uttarakhand, following which he got bail. Again in 2016, another case was reported from Rudrapur.
Though he had allegedly been abusing girls since 2004 in Delhi none of the victims came forward to file a complaint. “An FIR under Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) was registered against him for raping a minor in 2016 and he was jailed. He, however, got bail six months later. On the next date of hearing, Rastogi did not go to the court and went underground. He was subsequently declared an offender,” a police source said.
Rastogi, police said kept shifting his base since 2006. On December 13, 2016, another minor from New Ashok Nagar in East Delhi came forward to file a complaint. On January 12, two more minors approached the police with a similar complaint of being assaulted by a man in red jacket, who claimed to be their father’s friend.
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“We got three similar cases and when we connected the dots we found that it was the same man who assaulted the three girls. The investigation was then carried out and the man, who we had been looking for, was identified,” a police officer said.
Rastogi has been sent to 14-day judicial custody