NEW DELHI: Two taxi drivers were awarded death sentence by a Delhi court for killing 59-year-old Australian tourist Dawn Emilie Griggs after raping and robbing her in 2004. ( Watch ) "Jyotish Prasad and Ashish Kumar, for the offence of brutal murder of the Australian tourist, you be hanged till death," Additional Sessions Judge Vinod Kumar said, pronouncing the sentence in a packed courtroom.

The court also imposed a fine of Rs 3,000 each on the two convicts who were held guilty of gangrape, robbery, destruction of evidence and common intention. The court had convicted the two accused on August two. 'She was a foreigner...it's a breach of trust' NEW DELHI:

A city court on Monday awarded the death penalty to two cab drivers convicted for gangraping and murdering a 59-year-old Australian tourist four years ago. ASJ Vinod Kumar said: "The victim was of such an age that she should have been seen as a motherly figure. Committing rape of an old lady shows a mind which is more depraved than Dhananjoy Chatterjee's.

"Jyotish Prasad and Ashish Kumar, for the offence of brutal murder of the Australian tourist, you be hanged till death," the court said as it pronounced the sentence, even as the mother of Ashish Kumar, who awaited the verdict with folded hands, began wailing and had to be taken out of the courtroom crying, "My poor and innocent son is being wrongly awarded a death sentence." The court also imposed a fine of Rs 3,000 each on the two convicts who were held guilty of gangrape, robbery, destruction of evidence and common intention after they were convicted on August 02.

An official from Australian high commission was present in the courtroom, recording the proceedings. He however, refused to comment on the verdict. Continuing with his analogy with the Dhananjoy Chatterjee case in which the apex court had awarded death sentence to the accused in 2004, the judge said, "If the facts are seen closely, it would be found that the gravity of present case is more than the case before the Supreme Court.

" The fervent plea of the convicts that they should not be punished with the extreme penalty as the case was based on circumstantial evidence was rejected by the court, which said there is a "very high degree of certitude" against the convicts. Lamenting the lack of security for women in the capital, the trial court indicted Prasad and Kumar for "having an eye on some defenceless tourist" and added that "a foreign tourist, specially a lady, is the easiest prey.

" The ASJ said several "aggravating circumstances" had led the court to award death penalty to the convicts. It pointed out the brutal nature of the crime, including the fact that the convicts gagged Griggs and tried to gouge out her eye with a screw driver. ASJ Kumar also quoted from the SC ruling in the Dhananjoy case which had said that "rising crime rate, particularly violent crime against women, has made criminal sentencing by courts a subject of concern...justice demands that courts should impose punishment fitting to the crime so that courts reflect public abhorrence of the crime.

" The judge therefore concluded, "SC found Dhananjoy's case fit for award of death penalty. The present case is fitter." The accused had argued that there was no direct evidence, no eyewitness and that the prosecution had failed to specify the exact role played by each of them in the crime. When the convicts sought to take advantage of the fact that they were so poor that court had to provide legal assistance in the form of an amicus curiae (a friend of court) at state expense, the court said, "In order to put the record straight, it is made clear that Vikas Arora was appearing for Prasad as a private counsel.

" Arora termed the sentence as "unfortunate" and said that it was a fit case for appeal to high court even as the other defence lawyer, B S Chaudhary, hoped HC would appreciate that there wasn't enough evidence to link the convicts to the crime, leave alone award death penalty