Crime: A man charged with a series of burglaries in Gelephu was sentenced to 20 years in prison on December 6.

Tikhey Maji from Shantipur in Chirang district in Assam, India, pleaded guilty to the charges.

The court verdict stated he was a repeated offender and he was sentenced to three years and eight months in prison in October 2006 for burglary and larceny. “In 2011, he was sentenced for the same crime.”

However, the court verdict stated the court has not admitted the charges of larceny since the burglary has an element of larceny by itself.

Tikhey Maji was convicted for violating section 236 of the Penal Code of Bhutan. It is graded as a fourth degree felony.

The court verdict also stated that since Tikhey Maji is a recidivist, the court has enhanced the conviction degree in accordance to section 15 of the Penal Code of Bhutan, where it states that a defendant who is found guilty of the same offence shall, on the next conviction, could face a higher conviction. “If the crime is graded fourth degree felony, it shall be increased to third degree felony.”

Since Tikhey Maji has committed four crimes of similar nature and the court has convicted accordingly.

Property worth Nu 263,131 was recovered from the accused and handed over to the four victims who claimed losses of Nu 7.3M

The court has ordered the convict to restitute the property taken from the victims but since the accused is a non-Bhutanese and also because he failed to bring a guarantor to court, he shall serve the additional prison term.

Gelephu police arrested the convict on July 2016.

Yeshey Dema | Tsirang