Pune Porsche crash: doctors threw accused minor's blood sample into dustbin, say police

Pune Police Commissioner Amitesh Kumar on 27th May said that the blood sample collected of the minor involved in the Porsche accident belonged to another person who didn't consume alcohol.

Briefing the media after the arrest of two doctors of state-run Sassoon Hospital, Kumar said that the blood sample of the accused minor was thrown in the dustbin. Police have repeatedly claimed that the 17-year-old accused, who is the son of a prominent Pune realtor, was heavily drunk at the time of the accident.

"Sections 120 (B), 467 Forgery and 201, 213, 214 Destruction of evidence have been added in this matter. We received the forensic report yesterday and it has been revealed that the sample collected at Sassoon Hospital, which the doctor there sealed and wrote the name of the juvenile accused before sending it to the Forensics, was not the sample of the juvenile accused," Kumar said.

"After this, we detained the doctors who had sealed this report and sent it to forensics. During preliminary investigation, it was revealed that he had taken the sample of juvenile accused but had thrown it in the dustbin and replaced it with the sample of another person and sent it to the forensics. He did this on the instructions of Dr. Ajay Taware, who is the HOD of Forensic Medicine of Sassoon Hospital. We will produce them in court and request for police custody remand..."

On the instructions of Dr Taware, the juvenile's blood samples were thrown into a dustbin and replaced with the blood samples of another person, he said.

"The investigation also revealed that it was the juvenile's father who had called Dr Ajay Taware and offered him allurements to replace the blood samples," Kumar claimed.

The senior police official further said that as an abundant precaution, they had taken one more sample of the juvenile for DNA sampling and it was sent to another hospital.

"The report of the other hospital revealed the juvenile's blood report at the Sassoon Hospital was manipulated as the DNA of (blood samples of) both the reports did not match," he said.

Both the doctors did not have any idea that the police would take one more sample (of the accused juvenile), he said.

"A probe is underway on whose blood samples were collected to replace with that of the juvenile's. We have recovered CCTV footages of the Sassoon Hospital and further probe is on," Kumar said.

He also said that Indian Penal sections 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence), 120 B (criminal conspiracy) and other relevant sections have been added to the case in which the juvenile has been booked.

"We have made the juvenile's father co-accused in the present case," he said.

The teenager was initially granted bail by the Juvenile Justice Board, which also asked him to write an essay on road accidents, but following outrage over the lenient treatment and a review application by the police, he was sent to an observation home till June 5.

The police have arrested the teenager's father, who is a realtor, and his grandfather in connection with the accident.

Also read | Speeding Audi car fatally knocks down 63-year-old man in Noida