Man jailed for double murder

Deepak Nagpal. File photo / Alan Gibson

The man who admitted murdering a Tauranga mother and her daughter and stashing the 2-year-old girl's body in washing machine has been jailed for a minimum of 20 years.

Fruit packer Deepak Nagpal, 24, last year pleaded guilty to two charges of murder, after fatally stabbing Ravneet Sangha and her daughter Anna in their home on June 4 2010.

In the High Court at Rotorua this morning, Justice Brewer sentenced Nagpal to life imprisonment with a minimum non-parole period of 20 years.

After sentence was passed, Dev Sangha - the husband and father of the victims - burst out of the public gallery and ran up to Nagpal in the dock.

He yelled in Punjabi "I'll see you in 20 years", and had to be restrained by court staff and a supporter.

Nagpal was boarding with the Sangha family at their Otumoetai home before the attack.

Shortly before the attack, Mrs Sangha sent a text message to a close family friend indicating she had an issue with Nagpal concerning money and had asked him to leave the house.

During his trial, the court heard that Nagpal stabbed Mrs Sangha 100 times with a number of wounds delivered with such that force serrations were left on her skull.

Anna found her mother lying in a pool of blood in the laundry and fled to her bedroom and then the lounge, but was found by Nagpal who carried her back to the laundry and stabbed her 10 times in the face and neck, the crown said.

He then threw her body into the washing machine with his own clothing and turned it on.

Nagpal then took jewellery and ATM cards belonging to the Sangha family and over the next two days he took a total of $6853 from their account.

Police discovered Mrs Sangha's body at the Sanghas' home on June 6 2010 - two days after she was killed - following a tip-off from a member of the public.

They found Nagapl at a central Auckland address property.

Anna's body lay undiscovered for 20 more hours, despite an intensive search of the local area by police and search and rescue teams.

- With NZPA