Police File Chargesheet In Porsche Crash That Killed 2 Techies; Pune Teen's Parents Among 7 Named

Police have filed a chargesheet against seven accused in connection with the Porsche car accident case, including the parents of a minor boy who was allegedly behind the wheel, in a Pune court, more than two months after the fatal crash, an official said on Friday.

The 900-page chargesheet, submitted on Thursday in a sessions court, has excluded the 17-year-old boy, whose case is being handled separately by the Juvenile Justice Board (JJB), while the seven accused have been charged under IPC sections related to criminal conspiracy and causing disappearance of evidence, among others.

The high-end car allegedly driven by the minor under the influence of alcohol knocked down two motorbike-borne IT professionals originally hailing from Madhya Pradesh, one of them a woman, in Pune’s Kalyani Nagar area in the wee hours of May 19, killing them.

The boy’s father, Vishal Agarwal, is a prominent builder.

“We have filed a 900-page chargesheet against seven accused, including the parents of the minor, two doctors and a staffer from Sassoon General Hospital and two middlemen, in a Pune court on Thursday,” said Shailesh Balkawade, Additional Commissioner of Police (Crime).

The boy’s parents and two Sassoon General Hospital doctors — Ajay Taware, then-HOD of the forensic medicine department, and Dr Shrihari Halnor — and one Atul Ghatkamble, a staffer at the Maharashtra government-run medical facility, are accused of swapping the blood samples of the minor with those of his mother after the crash.

The juvenile’s blood samples were replaced with those of his mother to evade detection of alcohol content.

Two other accused — Ashpak Makandar and Amar Gaikwad — acted as middlemen between the boy’s father and the doctors to facilitate financial transactions to swap the blood samples, according to the chargesheet.

The voluminous police document contains statements of 50 witnesses.

Additional Commissioner of Police Balkawade said the chargesheet contains a crash impact analysis report, technical evidence, forensic laboratory and DNA reports.

The police had prepared a crash impact analysis report of the accident with the help of a forensic expert. The purpose of the report is to correlate the impact of the Porsche car on the motorbike involved in the accident and also correlate with injuries of the IT professionals who died.

Last month, the police had submitted the final report to the JJB detailing all evidence against the 17-year-old boy in the car crash case.

While the minor boy’s parents are still in jail, he was released from an observation home in Pune following a Bombay High Court order late last month.

Besides the main case related to the crash, the police had slapped two more cases — one against owners and staffers of Cosie restaurant and Hotel Blak Club, where the teenager allegedly consumed liquor before the accident, and also the father of the juvenile under sections 75 and 77 of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act.

While section 77 of the JJ Act deals with supplying a child with intoxicating liquor or drugs, which was applicable to the owner and managers of the two establishments, section 75 of JJ Act deals with punishment for cruelty to child. The section 75 applies to the boy’s father as he gave his son the car despite knowing the boy did not have a driving license, thus endangering his life. He also allowed his son to party even while knowing he drinks alcohol.

The second case was registered against the father and the grandfather of the minor for allegedly kidnapping and confining their family driver and then threatening and pressuring him to tell the police that he was behind the wheel at the time of the crash.

The police, after obtaining blood reports and finding they were manipulated, added IPC sections 201 (causing disappearance of evidence), 120B (criminal conspiracy), 467 (forgery of valuable security), 213 (taking gift, etc to screen an offender from punishment) and 214 (offering gift or restoration of property in consideration of screening offender) to the original offence lodged against the minor.

The original offence was registered under section IPC sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), 304A (causing death by negligence), 279 (rash driving) and relevant sections of the Motor Vehicles Act.