He shows no remorse, doesn’t shy away from eye contact and answers all questions. “I did all this, what can I do?” is what he is learnt to have repeatedly told his interrogators. It’s the same nonchalance with which he walked into bhandaras for free meals after raping and murdering children. When did he commit his first crime? He says he does not remember.
Police on Wednesday dug out all complaints of girls below 10 who have gone missing in the city as they try to determine the extent of 20-year-old Sunil’s crimes. The alleged paedophile-serial killer has so far confessed to raping and killing nine girls since November 2016, three in Gurugram, four in Delhi, one in Gwalior and one in Jhansi. They have also sought information on unsolved cases of girls who have gone missing or have been murdered from police in Delhi and Madhya Pradesh
According to transcripts of the interrogation, Sunil has told police he raped all the girls he kidnapped twice before killing them. He has also said he is addicted to alcohol. But the way he went about choosing his targets does not seem like the work of a drunk man — Sunil told interrogators he believed he was “safe” if he only attacked little girls because they would not be able to clearly tell their parents about him, should any of the victims survive. He ensured they did not, killing them with the same brutality with which he sexually assaulted them. The three-year-old girl whose murder on November 12 triggered the manhunt for him was found with her skull smashed.
Sunil has also said the first time he attacked a girl was in Delhi’s Sangam Vihar, where he had gone to attend a wedding, in 2015. He had tried to force himself on a 16-year-old girl — he himself would have been around 17 then — but the girl raised an alarm. “I ran for my life after that and have not gone there till date,” he has told interrogators
Police, however, are not looking beyond that as well, a probe that could take weeks, even months, to piece together since most of his victims were daughters of migrant parents living in slums who keep changing addresses and cities.
Sunil, a loner who led a vagabond life, would disappear from the shanty in Gurugram where his sisters and mother live sometimes for weeks, sometimes months. He would spend the days sleeping at bus stops, pavements and temple courtyards and eating at bhandaras. He was, at least once, beaten up by local residents near Sai Dham temple in Gurugram for molesting children — there might have been other such cases that the cops are now probing — but ran away. Only, however, in search of another bhandara where he could target more children.
He told police his family was aware of his behaviour and told him to stay at home. They allegedly even tried to confine him but he would find a way to escape. “We are collecting concrete evidence against the accused. We will ensure speedy justice and take the case to the fast-track court at the earliest,” said Sumit Kuhar, DCP (crime) .