Guntur woman who killed son surrenders to police

GUNTUR:  A 40-year-old woman, who killed her 17-year-old son at AT Agraharam here on February 6 evening, surrendered at Nagarampalem police station on Tuesday. According to Nagarampalem police, Sumalatha, a sweeper employed with the Guntur Municipal Corporation (GMC) on contract basis, has been living in a rented house at AT Agraharam for the past two months along with her son Vallepu Siddhartha. She was the sole breadwinner in her family since her husband’s death due to ill health 10 years ago. Sumalatha’s son Siddhartha had dropped out of school and was addicted to alcohol and ganja. He used to frequently harass his mother for money. In order to fund his vices, Siddhartha started committing thefts. He was also sent to juvenile home on 14-month remand in attempt to rape case.

On Saturday, there was a quarrel between the woman and her son, said neighbours who overheard the two. Later, they saw Sumalatha leaving the house, screaming she had “finally got rid of him”. Suspecting something fishy, neighbours went inside the house and noticed Siddhartha lying on the floor. On receiving information from the locals, police rushed to the spot and shifted the body to the government general hospital (GGH) for post-mortem. Based on the evidence collected from the crime scene, a case of murder under Section 302 of IPC was registered against Sumalatha and the police launched a search operation to trace her. However, on Tuesday, Sumalatha surrendered at Nagarampalem police station. The police produced her in the court.