Murderer of Indian-American sheriff's deputy, Sandeep Dhaliwal, sentenced to death
Darpan News Desk IANS, 27 Oct, 2022 03:17 PM
New York, Oct 27 (IANS) The man who murdered an Indian-American Sikh sheriffs deputy in Texas has been sentenced to death, according to officials.
The verdict was handed down on Wednesday by the jury, a panel made up of citizens, which had earlier found Robert Solis guilty of murdering Sandeep Dhaliwal in 2019.
Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez tweeted: "Verdict is in: Jurors sentence Robert Solis to death. We are extremely grateful that justice has been served."
Dhaliwal had made headlines when the obtained a religious exemption in 2015 to wear a turban as part of his uniform as a deputy for Harris County sheriff.
"Sandeep changed our Sheriff's Office family for the better, and we continue striving to live up to his example of servant leadership. May he Rest In Peace," Gonzalez tweeted.
History-sheeter Solis, who dismissed his lawyer and presented a bizarre defence while admitting he had fired the shot that killed Dhaliwal, defiantly told the jury after the guilty verdict on October 17, "since you believe I'm guilty of capital murder, I believe you should give me the death penalty".
And the jury obliged him.
He could appeal to higher courts all the way to the US Supreme Court and if the sentence is upheld the execution will be by the injection of Pentobarbital, a lethal drug, according to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.
Solis shot Dhaliwal in the back of the head in December 2019 near Houston as the officer was returning to his vehicle after a traffic stop, according to the prosecution.
The trial was held in two phases: In the first, the jury considered the charges and the evidence and found him guilty, and in the second, it decided on the sentence after considering more evidence about Solis who, according to ABC13 TV has arrest records going back at least 25 years.
Solis was convicted in a kidnapping and assault case in 2002 and sentenced to 20 years, but was paroled in 2014.
When he killed Dhaliwal, there was a warrant for his arrest in connection with an assault complaint by a former girlfriend.
During the proceedings for determining the penalty, the court heard testimony from various sources to bolster the prosecution's case for the death penalty.
Among them, the father of a former girlfriend blamed him for her death.
A woman reported being raped by Solis, which he admitted.
The mother of his three children told the jury he was a "psychopath" while describing his violent outbursts and said his children did not want to see him again.
Dhaliwal, who was 42 and had served as a sheriff's deputy for 10 years when he was killed, is survived by his wife and three children, according to Tunnel to Towers Foundation which honours the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attack on the World Trade Centre by raising funds to help families of first responders killed in action.
It said that he became a law enforcement officer "to help build the relationship between the Sikh community and the Sheriff's Department".
"He organised volunteers to help his fellow Texans after Hurricane Harvey devastated much of the state in 2017, and he travelled to Puerto Rico to help with relief after Hurricane Maria" in the same year, it added.
Balwani faced 10 counts of wire fraud and two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. After a three-month trial, a jury has found him guilty of all 12 counts. He now faces up to 20 years in prison for each count, The Verge reported late on Thursday.
But the public liking for him was dented when this year he introduced taxes to reduce the government's heavy borrowings. This was followed by controversy over his wife avoiding paying taxes in Britain and instead doing so at a lower rate in India from her dividends from shares in Infosys, the Bangalore-based software giant founded by her father N.R. Narayana Murthy.
Addressing the media outside 10, Downing Street, the 58-year-old embattled British leader, who has faced controversies galore in his 1,079 days in power, said: "It is clearly now the will of the parliamentary Conservative Party that there should be a new leader of the party and therefore a new Prime Minister."
According to state broadcaster NHK, the incident took place at around 11. 30 a.m. (local time) near the Yamatosaidaiji Station in Nara city while the 67-year-old former leader was making a speech for a Liberal Democratic Party candidate's election campaign.
Six people were killed and more than two dozen injured when shots rang out in the middle of a Fourth of July parade in Highland Park, Ill. Video clips posted to social media showed the festivities collapsing into panic as revellers realized they were under fire and scrambled for cover.
Five people have been shot dead, as per city officials, in the parade in Highland Park, north of Chicago, which was suddenly halted about 10 minutes after it began as gunshots were heard.
