HYDERABAD:  Forensic experts, who conducted a post-mortem on Maruthi’s chopped remains, said the brutal crime was among the rarest of rare cases. The body bore ante-mortem injuries, meaning they were inflicted before death, said Dr T Krupal Singh, HOD of forensic medicine at Gandhi Hospital, who led the forensic team. The body was dismembered and segregated into different buckets, one stuffed with the viscera. The head, though separated from the trunk, bore no injury marks. 

The body bore no signs of a struggle, indicating it was chopped after the victim fell unconscious, the experts said, adding that if Maruthi was conscious, there would have been marks or injuries indicating some resistance. A good amount of time was taken to cut the body into pieces, they found. The post-mortem examination itself took about two hours, much longer than it would in any regular case.

“The murder could have occurred at least 36 hours ago, and a sharp weapon was used to chop the body. But the exact cause of death and how it happened will only be known after detailed chemical analysis. The viscera has been sent for forensic analysis and bones were preserved for DNA profiling,” said Dr Singh. The doctors suspect that the family members suffered from a psychiatric disorder, which led the son to commit the brutal murder, and the victim’s wife and daughter to witness it without any objection.