A Dhaka court has indicted Harun-or-Rashid, the lone accused in a case filed over raping and killing of seven-year-old schoolgirl Samiya Afrin Saima in Dhaka’s Wari area.
Judge Kazi Abdul Hannan of the Dhaka Women and Children Repression Prevention Tribunal 1 framed the charges on Thursday after rejecting a discharge petition filed by the accused in the much-talked-about case.
After framing the charges, the court fixed January 8 for recording deposition of the witnesses in the case.
The tribunal judge read out the charges and asked the accused whether he was guilty or not. The accused claimed his innocence and prayed for justice.
The court, however, sent the accused to jail later.
On July 5, 2019, Saima, a nursery student of Silverdale Preparatory and Girls High School, went missing after she came out of their flat, housed on the sixth floor of the building, for going to their neighbour's flat to play with her friends.
Later, the body of Saima was found with a rope tied around her neck in the kitchen of an unfinished apartment on the eighth floor of the same building.
The autopsy report said that the girl was raped before her murder.
On July 7, police arrested Harun-or-Rashid, relative of one of Saima's neighbours, at his village home in Comilla.
Later, he gave a statement confessing his crime in the case before a Dhaka court.
On November 5, Detective Branch (DB) of Police Inspector Md Arjun, also the investigation officer of the case, submitted a charge sheet against the lone accused Harun to the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate's Court in Dhaka, showing 23 people as prosecution witnesses.