LONDON – A British court has convicted two men and a woman, who claimed to have been a victim, of killing a 21-year-old Indo-British TV executive in south-east London last year.
Prosecutors said Gagandip Singh was beaten and left to die in a burning car in Blackheath.
Gagandip’s killers had decided to “play God” after one of the accused medical student Mundill Mahil claimed the victim allegedly tried to rape medical student Mundill Mahil (20) six months before he died, they said.
Mahil lured Gagandip down to her university house in Brighton last February where he was set upon by Harvinder Shoker and Darren Peters, who viciously beat him up before bundling him into the boot of a car and driving it to Blackheath, where they set it alight.
Shoker was found guilty of murder by a majority verdict of 10-2 by a jury at the Old Bailey, while Peters was found guilty of manslaughter and Mahil of causing grievous bodily harm. The trio had denied murder.
Mahil from Chatham, Kent, Shoker (20) of Greenwich and Peters (20) from Blackheath will be sentenced on Wednesday.
Mahil had confided in Shoker about the attempted sex attack, and he recruited Peters to help him in the plot against Gagandip. Mahil insisted that she had no idea that Gagandip would be hurt, instead believing the two men were going to take him to see an older man called Sonny to be lectured about religion and how to treat women.
In his closing speech, prosecutor Aftab Jafferjee told jurors: “Gagandip had his share of faults. He may have deserved some punishment. But for a group of youngsters to decide that they are the custodians of Sikh virtue and play God on the subject of religious duty and moral obligation is a grotesque turn of events.”
