SIVAGANGA
Within less than 12 hours after a speech and hearing-impaired girl was found sexually assaulted and murdered near her house at Acharampatti village under Keezhasevalpatti police limits in Tirupattur police sub-division, the district police nabbed the culprit – a 27-year-old local man – on Tuesday night.
After the sniffer dog gave some vital clues, suggesting that the culprit hailed from the village, Superintendent of Police T. Jayachandran, leading three special teams formed to nab the accused, camped in the village the whole of Tuesday night and finally the police nabbed the accused, P. Manickam (27), a married man.
“The accused was hiding on the outskirts of the village,” the SP said and appreciated the special teams for cracking the case quickly and arresting the accused. The accused was produced before a magistrate court on Wednesday and remanded in judicial custody, he said.
Interrogation revealed that Manickam had misbehaved with a woman in the village three months ago and the villagers ‘settled the matter’ by themselves without reporting it to the police, the SP said, adding steps would be taken to detain the accused under the Goondas Act.
The police said the deceased, who was alone at her house after her father, a painter, and mother, a farm worker, had gone for work and sister gone to school, stepped out of the house to take bath in an enclosure covered with thatched leaves, when the accused took her inside the house and tried to rape her.
When the girl put up resistance, he hit her with a cutting player found in the house, inflicting a bleeding injury on her head. As the girl was in a semi-conscious condition, he lifted her on his shoulder to the nearby bushy area and sexually assaulted her, the police said, citing his confessional statement.
Then, he strangulated her to death, fearing that she might land him in trouble, the police said. The post mortem report revealed that she was raped and strangulated to death, the police said.
The police had also recovered the girl’s gold ear studs from him. He had washed his blood-stained shirt after the crime, the police said.