Aarushi Murder: THE Forensic Expert Analyses
It is a big shame for the police investigative skill in India the way the Noida Police handled first the Aarushi murder with the sole intention of saving the perpetrators right from the beginning and later by the CBI teams employing the only investigating skill they are well-versed with in recent years, namely the bogus techniques of narco, lie detection and brain fingerprinting marketed by two Indian psychologists.
It is not known why Noida police, a neighbourhood police of Country’s capital has not summoned services of forensic scientists to assist them in crime scene investigation. I cannot imagine that Noida police would be so primitive and un-intellectual in their investigation not knowing even the basic necessity of searching thoroughly the entire area of Talwar’s residence including the terrace and surroundings. This could have helped in locating the body of the servant in the terrace at the very first instance and collecting many clues including the cloth or other material used to wipe out the blood stains.
This material would definitely give information about those involved in ‘dressing up’ the crime scene. Now forensic scientists are aware of the technology used to detect blood stains even after the floors and walls are washed. Therefore the remnants of blood stains after wiping could have easily been collected and examined to find out whether more than one person is involved in the scuffle. At this instance I remember the case of murder of the wife of an Army Major the vital clue was collected not anywhere in his house but in the distant corner of the huge gardens surrounding the case.(I will tell more about this similar later)
The CBI declares that the crime scene was dressed up. Who dressed up? Nobody other than the Talwars and the inmates of his residence as well as the Noida Police could have indulged in this dastardly act. The Forensic human behaviour analysts are watching the extraordinary pretended reaction of the Talwars before the TV Cameras these days. The CBI could have taken to task the members of the Noida police for their deliberate omissions and commissions in order to save the culprits. I feel it is imminent to include them in the list of offenders and interrogate them making use of all methods of ‘sustained interrogation’. We have to get the truth out of the Noida place. I don’t think CBI is competent to reinvestigate the case. Their skill of investigation has become static succumbing to pseudo scientific tests such as narco, lie-detection and brain mapping and not resorting to employing any other forensic tools.
It is surprising that that CBI is declaring that narco, lie-detection and brain mapping in Aarushi murder case is inconclusive. These tests claim to indicate only ‘yes’ or ‘no’ knowledge about the case, a fight or flight response. The CBI is very capable of establishing the guilt only and only with the results of these bogus techniques when no other evidence is available. They established the guilt of the domestic servant Ajay Kumar Pal to the accuracy of 99.9 percent only with the help of these techniques before the Supreme Court Bench comprising Justices M.K. Sharma and H.L. Dattu.
The Bench in the above case convicted Ajay Kumar Pal solely depending on the report of the Ahmadabad psychologist’s primitive and premature tests submitted by CBI. Of course the bench in their decision applied the ignominious doctrine of the ‘rarest of the rare’ case.
In Aarushi murder, in spite of the initial destruction of physical evidence in the crime scene, I think there has been enough circumstantial evidence for the CBI to take the offender to the court if they had only properly used their skill of sustained interrogation instead of rushing for the bogus tests.
On the very first crucial day the Talwars managed to divert the attention of Noida police and made them to suspect their family's live-in man-servant, Yam Prasad Banjade alias Hemraj, a 45-yr-old Nepalese national as the murderer. The Noida Police, even without conducting preliminary crime scene examination, joined hands with the Talwars for the reasons best known to them and rushed to the Railway station to catch Hemiraj, while his body was actually lying in the terrace.
It is surprising that the Dr. Rajesh Talwar who has exhibited profound knowledge in ‘touch DNA forensics’ at later stages did not preserve the crime scene and insist on summoning a forensic expert to examine the scene. On the contrary, the Talwars conveniently got Arushi's room washed. When once Hemiraj’s body was found, Talwar managed to bring in his former Nepalese domestic help Vishnu Sharma as a suspect.
When CBI was entrusted the case, Talwar was arrested. The arrest followed polygraph test and Narco Analysis test at Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL), Bangalore. He was earlier subjected to polygraph test twice at Central Forensic Science Laboratory (CFSL), Delhi as well as psychological assessment test at AIIMS, New Delhi. Based on these reports Krishna (alias Kishan), the Nepalese compounder of Talwar was arrested.
Next, the Talwars' family friends Duranis' Nepalese domestic help Rajkumar was arrested on the suspicion of involvement in the murder. Vijay Mandal the domestic help of a neighbour of the Talwars was also arrested.
While all the other forensic investigation and collection of physical evidence were given a clean go by, scrupulously lie detection test was conducted more than once on all the above suspects as well as on the mother of Aarushi, Dr. Nupur. Some of them were subjected to narcoanalysis and brain fingerprinting as well. And yet the CBI’s most trusted truth detecting tests gave no results useful to them.
The Central Forensic Laboratory in Hyderabad opined that Aarushi's vaginal samples were substituted with those of an unknown woman. The correct samples could have helped to establish who killed the teenager, and whether she was sexually assaulted before being stabbed. The clothes on Aarushi’s body were found to be soaked in blood. But the forensic lab received clean clothes. The CBI did not bother to establish as to who is responsible for the substitution.
Aarushi spoke to her close friend 688 times in the 45 days preceding her murder. It is not known whether the recording of these speeches were recovered and critically analysed.
The examination of some washed T-shirts of Rajkumar containing faint blood stains for DNA matching also did not yield any result.
There were no signs of forced entry to Talwar’s house thus confining the murder job only to the inmates. The door of Arushi's room could be opened from either side. The keys were always with Nupur and the keys could not be traced that day.
The dimensions of the injuries measuring about 8 x 3 cms identically on Arushi and Hemraj was found matching with those of Talwar’s golf club recovered after considerable lapse of time. It was also found that Talwar was surfing the internet till 11.50 pm while Arushi was murdered between midnight and 1 am.
When CBI took over the case, it is said that the chief minister Mayawati promptly gave transfer orders to senior police officers of the Special Investigation Team (SIT) that had previously been in charge of the investigation, including the Noida Senior Superintendent of Police, Satish Ganesh, and Meerut Inspector General, Gurdarshan Singh. In addition, the deputation of CBI officer Arun Kumar, formerly a member of the Uttar Pradesh Police, who was in charge of the investigation also ended in July, 2008. Did the CBI interrogate these police personnel and obtain statements about their involvement in investigation?
Thus from the very beginning the investigation into Aarushi’s death was marred by poor crime-scene management and lapses in procedure. The CBI has now filed its closure report saying that there is no eye-witness to the crime and that the motive could not be established.
The CBI in its closure report cites several instances of circumstantial evidence against Rajesh Talwar and dubs him as an "accused'' in the twin murder of his daughter 14-year-old Aarushi and domestic help Hemraj in 2008. The CBI also objected in court to the plea of Talwars seeking a copy of the closure report in the case and declared that Talwar is an accused in the case.
What is prudent to be done at this stage?
Veerappa Moily’anguish to reopen the case is genuine and I agree with him with one condition that a special investigation team constituted for the purpose should be entrusted with Aarushi’s Case. The CBI which is infested with the bogus truth detecting techniques now marketed by Ahmadabad FSL, shall not be asked to reinvestigate the case.
I am no hater of Forensic psychology. I hate only the bogus psychologists who want to thrive only with the pseudoscientific procedures. I therefore suggest that, in addition to all the investigative tools the proposed team may adopt, they should conduct forensic psychiatric evaluations of all the suspects.
Forensic Psychiatric Evaluations
Though standardized tests such as Stanford-Binet and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory are helpful, a proper forensic psychiatric evaluation is mostly based upon interviewing the suspects directly. A proper examination requires multiple interviews, detailed reviews, and comparison of what the suspects have stated on different occasions as well as microanalysis of his or her answers for sequence, tone and nonverbal responses. Further, the subject's testimony has to be checked for consistency with all of the physical evidence in a judicial proceeding. Oftentimes, inconsistencies can be explained by stress, denial, or simply the unwillingness of the suspects to incriminate themselves. The goal of the forensic psychiatrist/ psychologist is to conduct an evaluation that builds a rapport with the suspects in order to construct an accurate picture of their past and current mental, emotional and physical states.
Whom would I say the culprits? In this context I have to agree with CBI and their declaration that Talwar as an accused in the closure report.
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