Crime Patrol: Mithila Mohan murder case cracked after seven years (Episode 372, 373, 374 on 23rd, 24th & 25th May 2014)

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The Inside Story

The Crime Branch on Wednesday arrested Santhosh Kumar, the first accused in the murder of liquor contractor V.A. Mohanan alias Mithila Mohan, seven years after the sensational murder rocked the city. Mohanan was shot to death at his house on April 5, 2006.



Santhosh Kumar(47) alias Kannan of Pottekadu House Pattupurackal, Thrissur, was arrested by the Crime Branch team led by K.G. Simon, Superintendent of Police.

Santhosh was one of the suspects and had been interrogated by the investigation team 16 times after it took over the probe from local police on June 19, 2006. He always denied his involvement till the Crime Branch decided to do a polygraph test and brain-mapping on him. “That made him confess to the crime”, said Mr. Simon.



STORIES OF RIVALRY



It was a complicated case as the deceased had too many enemies. Mohanan used to leak information about the movement of illicit spirit and Santhosh Kumar was one of the affected parties. He told the investigators that Mohanan stole his truck and demanded a payment of Rs. Three lakh and then leaked information about his attempt to smuggle spirit in Palakkad. Pattambi police seized his tanker truck and registered a case in 2005.



Santhosh told the police that the decision to eliminate Mohanan was taken then as these incidents “devastated” him. He got in touch with Pandiyan, a notorious criminal from Dindigul, in Tamil Nadu to hire two professional shooters.



The shooters did a reconnaissance a month before committing the crime. Santhosh had given them a photograph of Mohanan, which was taken while he went for a morning walk. The team returned a day before the crime. The contract was fixed for Rs. 10 lakh and Rs. 20,000 was paid in advance.



The murder was committed on the eve of the One-Day International cricket match between India and England here. But that was just coincidental, said Mr. Simon. The assailants rang the calling bell at Mohanan’s house and his daughter-in-law responded to the call. They asked for Mohanan and when he came to the door, five shots were fired at him. The incident did not attract the attention of the neighbours as fire-crackers were being burst to mark Vishu festival.



The next day, the assailants left for Coimbatore where Santhosh met them and made a payment of Rs. 10 lakh. Santhosh told the police that the assailants came back in 2009 and volunteered to surrender if he paid them Rs. 2.5 lakh each. However, he suspected they were attempting to cheat him and hence did not pay.



The Crime Branch team is yet to track down the contract killers and recover the weapons used. The accused will be produced before the Ernakulam Judicial First Class Magistrate Court on Thursday.



Long list of suspects, rumours



The hard part of the investigation was eliminating the long list of suspects and narrow down on the accused, said K.G. Simon, Superintendent of Police.



The list of suspects included Thampi, who was a stranger to Mohanan and was spotted attending the marriage function of latter’s son.



Another suspect was Martin, whose slip of tongue did him in. During a drinking session in the Middle East where he worked, he claimed he was the killer. The police brought him to Kerala and questioned him. However, his involvement was ruled out.



Sadanandan, Mohanan’s assistant and Anwar, driver of one of his trucks, were also suspected and interrogated in detail during the probe. The Crime Branch team also checked the possibility of Rafi, another spirit smuggler from Thiruvananthapuram, getting involved as Mohanan had given him much trouble.



There were news reports that Satish Kalia, one of the sharp-shooters of in the Chotta Rajan gang, was hired for the crime. However, police ruled out the possibility after finding out that he was in prison.



When Manoj, the eldest son of Mohanan was summoned,0he moved an anticipatory bail petition, triggering another set of media reports. Maneesh, younger son of Mohanan, demanded a CBI probe into the case.



The police had interrogated nearly 110 witnesses in the case.



Thanks to:

http://www.thehindu.com/

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Crime Patrol: Missing woman, daughters found buried in shop (Episode 370, 371 on 17th, 18th May 2014)

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The Inside Story

KOLKATA: A woman and her two young daughters, who had been missing for a fortnight from their flat in Ekbalpore, were found murdered on Sunday with their heads smashed in and bodies packed in a couple of trunks. Four people — one of them a minor — have been arrested. The triple murders were the fallout of a property dispute, said police.



TOI was the first to highlight the mysterious disappearance of 37-year-old Pushpa Sharma and her daughters Pradipti (14) and Aradhana (12). The breakthrough came on the same day the report was published and 13 days after the victims' family members had come down to Kolkata from Ghazipur, Uttar Pradesh, to register a formal FIR.

The police are particularly amazed at the grisly manner in which the murders were committed: the three victims had their heads smashed with a heavy hammer. The bodies were then packed in a couple of trunks and buried in a shop, with a layer of cement poured over to avoid detection.



According to the police of the Port division, Pushpa's husband, Pradeep, had passed away five years ago. Two years after that, Pushpa had paid Rs 15 lakh to "buy" the flat on Sudhir Basu Lane — a stone's throw from the busy Ekbalpore stretch of Diamond Harbour Road — from Mohd Sikandar. The 37-year-old Sikandar, the prime accused in the murder, had worked at several hotels in Denmark and Hong Kong before beginning to dabble in real estate around five years back, said the cops.



The cops said there's a unique property dealing system prevalent in the area — a "rent-and buy" system — which Pushpa and Sikandar agreed to go by. Under this system, Sikandar asked Pushpa to additionally pay him Rs 1,000 in rent per month. "This buy-and-rent system is not found anywhere else," said a source in the detective department. "In this system, the buyer has to pay upfront and continue to pay a certain amount as rent afterwards for a fixed period to retain possession of the house. This is called tenancy rights." The transfer of ownership is only done after all the instalments have been paid, said the source.



The system was working fine until Sikandar proposed to buy back the house for Rs 21 lakh. The police said that Pushpa had agreed to it initially and had even taken Rs 13 lakh as advance from Sikandar in two instalments, though there are no written records of this. But she reportedly backed out at the last moment after she came to know from neighbours that the current market price of the flat was well over Rs 27 lakh. The neighbours also told police that Pushpa appeared to be in a hurry to leave the place and that Sikandar feared that she would sell the tenancy rights to someone else.



The cops said that Pushpa — who lived on the third floor of the building — often humiliated Sikandar, a fourth-floor resident, in public, calling him a cheat. That was why he probably hatched a careful plan to eliminate her, said an officer.



Sikandar, said the cops, roped in three youths for the job, luring them with a promise of buying them a motorbike each. The three youths — the names of two of them are Mohd Amin and Asif Hamza, while we are not naming the third youth as he is a minor — posed as electricians and entered Pushpa's flat on the afternoon of March 29, under the pretext of having to do some electrical maintenance work. Pushpa was not in, but the two girls allowed the men to enter because they knew Sikandar well. Once inside, the accused used heavy hammers to smash the girls' heads. When Pushpa returned after 10 minutes, she was killed in similar fashion, said joint CP Mahbub Rahman.



The gang then embarked on Stage II of the plan. They placed an order for two large trunks from a shop in Fancy Market and took delivery of them at the flat. Sikandar and his men returned at midnight and packed one trunk with the bodies of the two girls and the other with Pushpa's body. They then carried the trunks around 100 metres to a shop on Diamond Harbour Road, which Sikandar owns, taking care to stuff generous amounts of naphthalene and wrapping up the bodies in large plastic sheets. Once in the shop, they took out the bodies and buried them in the shop floor and cemented the floor.



Pushpa's family got worried when she did not respond to calls on the night of March 29. The next day, a relative from Salkia arrived to find the flat locked. On March 31, the family lodged an abduction case at Ekbalpore police station.



Though Sikandar had remained a suspect, sources said he could not be pinned until some call record details established his role. He finally "broke" down on Sunday and all four accused were put under arrest. Cops claimed the delay was due to technical evidence that was being collected against the accused by the missing persons squad of the detective department and the Ekbalpore police.



The motive, however, is still not very clear, said police. "A post mortem will establish the exact time of murder. At present, we are not ruling out chances of sexual assault though it appears to be murder for both gain and personal enmity," said DC (Port) V Solomon Nisha Kumar.



Thanks to:

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/

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Crime Patrol: 5 dead as man goes on shooting spree (Episode 369 on 16th May 2014)

The Inside Story

A 35-year-old man allegedly shot dead five persons, including his elder brother Nehal Singh (50) and three nephews, over a dispute of land in Bulandshahar's Khanpur village on Sunday morning.



Nehal Singh's sister-in-law Ram Shree (35) was injured in the firing and has been admitted to hospital where doctors stated her condition stable.

The Bulandshahar police have arrested the accused Naresh Singh and recovered his licensed rifle which was used in the crime. The dead were, besides Nehal Singh, his sons Rahul (20), Bobby (17) and Raja (13) and neighbour Aneeta (30).



The police said Naresh killed Aneeta when she tried to intervene. Bulandshahar's Assistant SP (Rural) Ajay Kumar Sahni said around 15 rounds of bullets were fired.



Station Officer of Khanpur Manoj Yadav said there was a land dispute between Nehal Singh and Naresh. Naresh had been demanding a piece of land from his brother.



The police the only surviving person in Nehal's family is his wife Veerwati. She managed to get out of the house before Naresh arrived, said the police.



Thanks To:

http://indianexpress.com/

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Crime Patrol: Techie tries to stop child marriage in Noida, thrashed (Episode 358, 359 on 10th, 11th May 2014)

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PART 2







The Inside Story

Techie tries to stop child marriage in Noida, thrashed



NOIDA: A 29-year-old software engineer from Noida was battered when she tried to stop a woman from forcibly marrying off her daughter to a man 10 years older than her. The victim, also a volunteer with an NGO Aid India, is admitted in the ICU of a private hospital with serious injuries. Police said the techie was attacked with a knife and bricks by the prospective groom, who was egged on by the minor's mother. Cops have arrested him along with the mother.

Police said the victim, identified as Linkan Subuddhi, is a software developer with a leading USA-based IT company. The incident occurred around 11am on Thursday after Linkan reached the house of the 15-year-old Sabha (named changed) after getting a call for help. Sabha is a student of Class VIII in a charitable school in Noida. Linkan has been teaching the girl for the past year. Linkan had reportedly helped her a year ago in a similar issue and managed to ward off the marriage.



Sabha was allegedly being forced to marry her cousin, who has been living with the family for the last two years. As she was opposed to the marriage and wanted to continue with her studies, she called Linkan on Wednesday night to persuade her mother to give up the idea. "However, when Linkan reached the house on Thursday morning, the prospective groom Siraj and Sabha's mother got violent and attacked her," said Shivram Yadav, DSP, Noida.



Slipping in and out of consciousness, Linkan narrated the horrific incident to TOI. "While I was trying to convince Sabha's mother, Siraj whipped out a knife and sprung on me. I ran to save myself, but he chased me through the congested colony and finally cornered me. He tried to stab me, hit me on the head with a brick and attempted to strangle me. Sabha's mother also attacked me. I don't know what happened after that as I lost consciousness," Linkan said.



Colony residents intervened and rescued the profusely bleeding Linkan. She was taken to Kailash Hospital while the two accused fled. Doctors said Linkan has sustained severe head injuries and suffered internal haemorrhaging with multiple injuries all over her body. "We have had to give her more than 40 stitches on her head and body. Though critical, she is in a stable condition. We will have to observe her for 72 hours," said Dr Anoop Agarawal.



Linkan is a native of Odisha and has been residing in Noida since 2008. She also works as a project coordinator for Aid Noida, the Noida chapter of NGO Aid India. Sabha's father is absconding. His two other daughters were also married off when they were just 15 and 16 years old.



Thanks to:

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/

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Crime Patrol: India: Girl Rescued From Underground Dungeon After 'Godman' Staged Her Death Promising Rebirth on Shivaratri (Fraud Baba - Episode 366 - 9th May 2014)

The Inside Story

A seven-year-old has been rescued from the ashram of a godman in a village in the southern Indian state of Karnataka after spending 20 days trapped in an underground chamber.



The girl was found in the basement dungoen in Chandragiri Mutt, in Zunjarwad village in northern Karnataka, about 180km from Belgaum, which lies about 500km northwest of Bangalore.



She had been kept there after self-styled 'godman' Sadashivappa Nemagouda had staged her death on 2 February. According to reports, his plan was to free her today, during the Shivaratri festival, to prove that he has the power to bring people back to life.

Nemagouda had confined the girl to a nine feet high underground chamber in his ashram at Mutt, according to The New Indian Express.



Nemagouda, who now claims he had adopted the minor, has been arrested following the discovery of the girl.



He claimed that the girl had been kept alive through spiritual power, without any food or liquid. However, doctors who examined the rescued girl dismissed Nemagouda's claims, adding that the girl was stable but traumatised.



The local women and child welfare department have also dismissed Nemagouda's adoption claims, saying no legal procedures of adoption were followed.

The local authority has said that the government will now trace the family of the rescued girl.



Nemagouda stages girl's death

According to The Times of India, the godman kept the girl for performing Yog Samadhi, a ritual he claimed would benefit mankind by bringing the girl back to life after she was burnt alive.



Nemagouda claimed that the girl would come back to life on the day of Shivaratri, a Hindu festival which falls today, on 27 February. He sought donations from the villagers for the ritual and performed the staged burning ceremony in front of hundreds of villagers on 2 February.



"According to plan, ashram authorities placed the girl under logs of wood and burnt the pyre. As hundreds of devotees witnessed the event amid chants, the girl was whisked away and her body smeared with black paint and ash to show that she had been charred to death," the report said.



"Later she was confined in the underground cellar and the modus operandi was to produce her alive on Shivarathri day."



Police recovered food items, water, a lamp and other materials used for the ritual inside the underground cell where the unnamed girl had been held.



Five more children, believed to have been kept for performing similar rituals, were also rescued from the ashram following the incident.



Godman's crime chart

The so-called godman reportedly has a record of previous offences, including a charge of rape made against him in 2013.



According to reports, Nemagouda's reaction over his 2013 rape charges was to drop his clothes in front of accusers saying he was free of sexual desires.



In 2010, he was reportedly accused of attempted suicide after he claimed to have survived only on his spiritual powers while remaining in an underground cell without food and air for 15 days.



Police in India are dealing with the Swami after freeing the seven-year-old girl from the underground chamber in his ashram.



Thanks to:

https://uk.news.yahoo.com

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