NEW DELHI: Ten Indian policeman are facing a possible death penalty after being convicted of gunning down two businessmen they mistook for gangsters 10 years ago, reports said on Tuesday.

The police surrounded a car carrying three men in New Delhi’s busy commercial centre in March 1997 and fired at least 38 shots in broad daylight killing two of them, a Times of India report said.

But the third occupant of the car survived to establish the true identities of the dead as businessmen, not gangsters, the newspaper said.

“All the charges against you stand proved,” said Delhi court Judge Vinod Kumar in a judgment that found the police guilty of murder, attempted murder and destruction of evidence, the Press Trust of India said.

Such convictions are extremely rare despite allegations by rights activists of rampant extra-judicial killings, violence and corruption by police in India. The country’s slow-moving justice can take years to decide cases, with many public prosecutors reluctant to alienate law enforcement officers.—AFP