Merc hit-and-run: Court tells cops to reply on teen’s plea

A court here on Friday sought a response from Delhi police on a plea of the teenager accused of running over 32-year-old marketing executive Sidharth Sharma with his father’s Mercedes. The teen has challenged the Juvenile Justice Board’s (JJB) order to try him as an adult.

A court here on Friday sought a response from Delhi police on a plea of the teenager accused of running over 32-year-old marketing executive Sidharth Sharma with his father’s Mercedes. The teen has challenged the Juvenile Justice Board’s (JJB) order to try him as an adult.

The teenager has been accused of running over 32-year-old marketing executive Sidharth Sharma with his father’s Mercedes.(Hindustan Times)

The accused turned 18 just four days after the accident.

Additional Sessions Judge Vimal Kumar Yadav fixed July 2 for hearing the arguments of Delhi police and the teenager.

During the hearing, the teenager’s counsel informed the court that he did get a copy of the charge sheet.

On the court’s direction, the investigating officer provided a copy of the charge sheet and other documents annexed with it to the boy, who was present in court with his parents.

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Advocate Abhimanyu Kampani, who appeared for the teenager, said the presiding officer of JJB heard arguments without providing the charge sheet to the accused and ordered that he be tried as an adult by sending the case to a trial court.

Special Public Prosecutor Atul Shrivastava said as per the amended provisions of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, the sessions court cannot sent back the case to the board and if it thinks that the boy should not be tried as an adult, it has to try the case itself by acting as the board’s presiding officer.

The police also filed an application to cancel the bail of the boy’s father.

In the appeal, the boy’s counsel claimed that at best he could be booked for alleged offence of causing death by rash and negligent act and it was not a case of culpable homicide not amounting to murder for which he has been charged.

Read: Merc hit-and-run: Teen challenges juvenile court order to try him as adult

The appeal said the boy’s previous offences were of traffic violation and not related to accidents. So it’s not a ground to convert section 304A of IPC into section 304 of IPC.

On July 2, the court will hear the main case sent to it by JJB that had on June 4 ordered that the boy would face trial as an adult, while observing that his offence was “heinous”.

The board had passed the order on the police’s plea seeking transfer of the case to trial court to try the accused as an adult.

It is a first-of-its-kind case ever since the amendment in the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act 2015 which allowed the Board to transfer cases of heinous offences by children to the sessions court.