by India Today World DeskAn Indian-origin man in Australia has been convicted of raping five Korean women after drugging them and filming them on a hidden camera, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.
Balesh Dhankhar, a prominent member of the Indian diaspora in Australia with political links, faces over 39 charges, including 13 counts of rape, committed between January and October 2018. He was found guilty of all charges by a jury in the District Court in Sydney. on Monday.
The 43-year-old data expert broke down in court when the jury foreman answered “guilty” to each of the 39 charges against him, the Herald reports. He will face court again in May and will be sentenced at the end of the year.
Dhankhar was the head of Overseas Friends of BJP in Australia. He resigned from OFBJP Australia in July 2018, the organization said in a statement, soon after the allegations against him came to light.
modus operandi of a hunter
The jury heard that Dhankhar had a ‘very specific methodology’ to entrap women with fake job postings for Korean translators. He used the same hotel, cafe and Korean restaurant to meet the women before taking them to his studio apartment in the Sydney CBD under false pretenses.
Prosecutors said Dhankhar laced glasses of wine and other drinks with pills of the sleeping drug Stilnox or the infamous date-rape drug Rohypnol.
Dhankhar filmed the rape either on a hidden camera in his bedside alarm clock or on his mobile phone, both of which were recovered by the police.
When police searched Dhankhar’s apartment in October 2018, they found 47 videos of him having sex with women, some of whom were unconscious while others writhed and moaned in pain.
The rape videos were organized into folders, each labeled with the victim’s name.
arrest and trial
Dhankhar was arrested on October 21, 2018, after his fifth victim woke up while he was assaulting her, and hid in the bathroom to send a message to a friend.
Dhankhar pleads not guilty, claims that all five women consented to the sex, and was filmed, and faces a lengthy trial. All five of his accusers were subjected to grueling cross-examination in the court. Recordings of the sexual assaults were also played for the jury.
According to The Herald, the jury were “screaming” as they watched the video, and at one stage, when it became unbearable, they asked the judge to send them home early.
In his defence, Dhankhar said he lied to the women because he was single after the extramarital affair broke up. The report states that he attributed his loneliness to the “incomplete” intimacy of their marriage.
(With PTI inputs)