Arizona, Wisconsin certify Joe Biden as winner
Washington, Dec 1: Two battleground states of Arizona and Wisconsin on Monday formally certified Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden as the winner.
Incumbent Donald Trump had won both the states in 2016.
In Wisconsin, Biden won by 20,700 votes against Trump, who has refused to concede the election results so far. He alleges that there were massive voters' fraud and electoral malpractice.
Certifying the result, Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers said, Today, I carried out my duty to certify the November 3rd election, and as required by state and federal law, I've signed the Certificate of Ascertainment for the slate of electors for President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.
The formal certification from Wisconsin came a day after the state completed the recounting of votes in two of its counties as requested by Trump.
Earlier in the day, Arizona, which traditionally has been a Republican stronghold, also certified Biden as the winner with more than 10,000 votes.
Arizona has 11 members in the Electoral College. Biden now has 306 Electoral College votes against Trump's 232.
Every Arizona voter has my thanks and should know that they can stand proud that this election was conducted with transparency, accuracy and fairness in accordance with Arizona's laws and elections procedures despite numerous unfounded claims to the contrary," Arizona Governor Dough Hobbs said.
At the brief signing event to certify the election results, Hobbs said the system is strong. And that is why I have bragged on it so much.
Arizona certification came at the same time when Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani made a plea before several Republican State legislature that the lawmakers could and should throw out the election results.
They are certifying a false statement to the United States of America, Giuliani told the Republican lawmakers.
Trump has five days to challenge the certification of election results. Such total corruption. So sad for our country! Trump said in a tweet as the Arizona hearings were going on.
In another tweet, Trump said he is fighting on behalf of 74 million people who voted for him.
I'm not fighting for me, I'm fighting for the 74,000,000 million (sic) people (not including the many Trump ballots that were tossed ), a record for a sitting President, who voted for me! he said in a tweet.
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Delhi court sentences Haryana gangster Vikas Gulia, associate to life imprisonment
New Delhi (PTI): A Delhi court has sentenced Haryana gangster Vikas Gulia and his associate to life imprisonment under MCOCA provisions, but refused the death penalty saying the offences did not fall under the category of 'rarest of the rare cases'.
Additional Sessions Judge Vandana Jain sentenced Gulia and Dhirpal alias Kana to rigorous imprisonment for life under Section 3 (punishment for organised crime) of the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA).
In an order dated December 13, the judge said, "Death sentence can only be awarded in 'rarest of the rare cases' wherein the murder is committed in an extremely inhumane, barbarous, grotesque or dastardly manner as to arouse umbrage of the community at large."
The judge said that on weighing the aggravating and mitigating circumstances, it could be concluded that the present case did not fall under the category, and so, the death penalty could not be imposed upon the convicts.
"Thus, both the convicts are sentenced to undergo rigorous imprisonment for life and to pay a fine of Rs 3 lakh each, for committing the offence under Section 3 of MCOCA," she said.
The public prosecutor, seeking the death penalty for both the accused, submitted that they were involved in several unlawful activities while they were on bail in other cases.
He argued that the accused had shown no respect for the law and acted without any fear of legal consequences, and therefore did not deserve any leniency from the court.
The court noted that both convicts were involved in offences of murder, attempt to murder, extortion, robbery, house trespass, and criminal intimidation. Besides, they had misused the liberty of interim bail granted to them by absconding.
It said, "The terror of the convicts was such that it created fear psychosis in the mind of the general public, and they lost complete faith in the law enforcement agencies and chose to accede to the illegal demands of convicts. Despite suffering losses, they could not gather the courage to depose against them."
The court noted that Gulia was involved in at least 18 criminal cases, while Dhirpal had links to 10 serious offences.
It underlined that MCOCA had been enacted "keeping in view the fact that organised crime had come up as a serious threat to society, as it knew no territorial boundaries and is fuelled by illegal wealth generated by committing the offence of extortion, contract killings, kidnapping for ransom, collection of protection money, murder, etc."
Both accused persons had been convicted on December 10 in a case registered at Najafgarh police station. The police filed a chargesheet under Section 3 (punishment for organised crime) and 4 (punishment for possessing unaccountable wealth on behalf of member of organised crime syndicate) of MCOCA.
