Court examines witnesses in Monika Ghurde’s death case

PANAJI: The trial in the infamous murder case of photographer turned perfumer Monika Ghurde commenced at the Mapusa additional district sessions court recently, over two years after she was found dead at her rented apartment in Sapna Raj Valley, Sangolda on October 6, 2016.
It was the maid who alerted Ghurde’s neighbour and family after no one opened the door when she came came to work the next morning. Ghurde’s neighbour, an American woman who had a set of duplicate keys, opened the flat at 11.30am to find the 39-year-old, nicknamed the First Lady of Smell, in the nude on the bed, with her hands tied to the back of the bed.

Saligao PI Santosh S Dessai said charges have been framed in the case, trial has commenced and witnesses have already been examined.

Police filed a chargesheet in the case on January 6, 2017, before the judicial magistrate first class, Mapusa, naming the former security guard of the residential complex, Rajkumar Singh, for Ghurde’s rape and murder. Based on CCTV footage from an ATM at Porvorim, they had zeroed down on Singh and arrested him from a hotel in Bengaluru, on October 8, 2016 — two days after the murder.

In the course of interrogation, Singh admitted to the crime and said it was prompted by his anger at losing his job after Ghurde accused him of stealing an umbrella.