Swiss woman’s murder in Delhi: How the police deals with the murder of foreign nationals

Now, the family has at least given consent for a postmortem to be carried out in their absence, something that the Delhi Police has been awaiting for over a week. A three-member team at the Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Hospital will be carrying out the autopsy.

We look at the complications that the murder of foreign nationals poses to the police, and how they deal with them.

The standard procedure

In cases of murder, accident or suicide of a foreign national on Indian soil, the concerned state police verifies the identity of the victim through her passport, and then writes to the respective country’s embassy to trace and inform her next of kin. The embassy communicates with the victim’s kin, who are are asked to come to India, identify the body in person, and consent to a postmortem. Subsequently, the embassy issues a Consular Report of Death Abroad comprising the original death certificate from local authorities, postmortem report, burial/cremation certificates, and the police casefile.

The body is kept in cold storage until  the victim’s either arrives to take charge or provides directions about the disposition of the body. If the body remains unidentified, the police generally waits for a few weeks during which it puts up notices for identification of the deceased, before disposing it as per the standard procedure, in presence of an investigating officer (IO).

The complication in the Nina Berger case

While her parents have stated that they have a child named Nina Berger, the case has been complicated by them refusing to come Delhi to physically identify the body and cooperate with the probe.

In cases like this, family members usually provide circumstantial evidence used as additional material during the probe. “While direct evidence is usually given out by eyewitnesses, here, the only prime identification of Nina has been done by Gurpreet who has been constantly changing his versions pertaining to the motive behind the crime,” a senior officer privy to the ongoing probe told The Indian Express.

What can the Delhi Police do, then?

One possible option to identify the body will be to carry out DNA testing — blood, hair, skin or other samples from the deceased can be sent and matched with that of her kin. Also, given the family’s reluctance to come to Delhi, the police might also go to Switzerland for the probe instead. “One option for the police is to travel abroad, and get details from them [the family] on Nina and her travel here, which will be crucial evidence,” a senior officer told The Indian Express.

“In such cases where physical identification is not possible, circumstantial evidence in the form of chats and other electronic records, travel tickets, immigration details and identification of the person through the concerned Embassy, and the passport plays a major role in proving the case before courts,” Adv Jitender Kumar Jha, a criminal lawyer, told The Indian Express. “While physical identification by the kin is always considered important, there can be other ways to build a water-tight case,” he added.

“Physical identification of a body is always important in building a case in the absence of which, strong circumstantial evidence has to be brought forward so that the case does not fall flat before the court,” Maxwell Pereira, retired Delhi Police officer and former DCP (South), said. “While non-cooperation from family of the deceased can act against the police, the case will rest on other material collected which acts as full-proof confirmation of a deceased’s identity.”

Another officer said that if Nina’s family would like to join the probe, or carry her mortal remains back home country at a later stage, as per clearly laid out guidelines they would be handed over a piece of cloth. In cases where the deceased is cremated instead, their ashes would be handed over.