Murders after rape attempt

Two men who allegedly killed two five-year-old girls on Monday had lured the children to a flat offering them lipsticks, police said, adding, the culprits wanted to rape them.

The accused confined the kids to a room and pretended that they would “keep the promise”. In the meantime, they took yaba and played songs on a speaker.

At one stage, the men tried to rape the victims who started screaming. At this, the culprits strangled them to death.

Police came up with these information yesterday, hours after arresting the alleged killers -- Golam Mostafa, 28, and his cousin Azizul Bawani, 30 -- in the capital's Jatrabari and Demra areas on Tuesday night.

Azizul strangled Faria Akter Dola to death while Mostafa killed Dola's friend Nusrat Jahan with a towel, Farid Uddin Ahmed, deputy commissioner (Wari Division) of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police, told reporters at a press briefing.

Later in the day, police produced the two before a metropolitan magistrate who recorded their confessional statements, court sources said.

Both confessed that they were intoxicated during the time of the crime and that they murdered the children when they screamed, the sources said.

During the briefing at the DMP media centre, the DC said, “The accused played songs on loudspeakers so that no one could hear the victims' cries for help.”

Police recovered the bodies of the children from Mostafa's flat in Demra on Monday night, hours after they had gone missing from near their homes in the same area.

The brutal incident sparked protests in the locality and also captured the attention of social media users. The locals formed a human chain and held a rally demanding capital punishment for the killers.

A case was filed against Mostafa and Azizul with Demra Police Station on Tuesday night.

The DC said Mostafa called Azizul over phone, called him to his home and planned the rape instantly. Mostafa went to the girls and lured them to his house. His wife and child were away. 

The accused are drug addicts and Mostafa was also accused in a robbery case filed with Jatrabari Police Station, he said.

Police recovered the sandals of the victims, the speaker and the towel from Mostafa's house.

Meanwhile, the National Human Rights Commission yesterday formed a committee to investigate the double murder. The committee members yesterday visited the spot.

DAUGHTER TESTIFY AGAINST FATHER

A girl yesterday testified before a Dhaka court that her father, Nahid, killed a two-year-old baby by throwing her off the second floor of a building in Gendaria on Saturday.

In her statement, the girl, 12, said she went to her father's room, hearing the victim's screams. Minutes later, the man killed the baby, said DC Farid. 

“The circumstantial evidence suggested that Nahid took the baby in his house to rape her,” the police officer said, adding that they recovered the baby's clothes and a doll from the scene.

Earlier, locals had staged a demonstration in Gendaria, demanding capital punishment for Nahid over the incident.