Law student Jisha was murdered by Ameer ul-Islam. File photosKannur: The investigation into the sensational Perumbavoor murder case and the way the Kerala Police nailed down the man who killed the law student will easily make a crime thriller.
Police had suspected around 20 people at various stages of the probe before zeroing in on Ameerul Islam.
Last week, a court in Ernakulam found him guilty of the murder and sentenced him to death.
Investigation into this case was one of the most closely watched in Kerala. Even a top political leader’s name was dragged into the murder that took place before the 2016 assembly election.
The police relied upon circumstantial and scientific evidence to finally reach the culprit, in the process also clearing the names of the other suspects who too faced strong circumstantial evidences against them.
Some of the officials in the investigation team, speaking on the condition of anonymity, narrated the key moments of the probe.
Who killed?
Sreelekha was one of the first witnesses. She told the police about a person wearing a yellow shirt, who walked into the canal next to the student’s house on the day the murder took place.
A man who was plucking mangoes nearby recognized this suspect.
The police got his name and mobile number and when they called on his phone, he was out of town. That increased the suspicion and when inquired further, it was found that he was arrested a few days earlier for carrying ganja. That piece of information was in line with the police’s view that only a drug addict could commit a murder in such a heinous way as was in this case.
Mobile tower location
The suspect’s mobile tower location was traced to Kannur. He had gone to Kannur the day after the murder. When the police took him into custody, he told them that he was there searching for a hotel job.
On questioning, he said he was moving around with a knife to take revenge on a person who betrayed him in the drug case.
Curiously, he was wearing a yellow shirt. While he claimed that he wasn’t at Perumbavoor on the day of the murder, that didn’t tally with the statements of his friends and information on mobile tower location.
But he reiterated his innocence in this case. While the police collected circumstantial evidence against him during the five days when he was questioned, there were no scientific signs to link him to the crime. The first witness also affirmed that this was not the person she saw.
Key evidences in the first stage
1. Sreelekha’s statement
2. A cut on the dead student’s body from a possible bite by the murderer
3. Gap between the culprit’s teeth as indicated by the cut
4. A slipper found 100 meters from the crime scene, suspected to be of the culprit
5. The knife used in the murder
6. Saliva left on the student’s dress and the DNA extracted from it
7. Skin found in the student’s nail, and the DNA from it
8. Yellow shirt
Of these, indication of the gap teeth had confused the police throughout the probe. Scientific explanations of this evidence, including questions over its validly, were reasons for controversy.
From hotel worker to immoral activities
While the police were questioning the hotel worker, his mother approached them and gave indications of another person. ‘Sirs, if you were looking for someone who had fled the place, it could be this person. He is now in Bangalore,’ she told the investigators.
She gave his name and phone number. Police found that he had left for Bengaluru the day after the murder. Moreover, they got information that he was beaten up twice by locals for alleged immoral activities.
He was taken into custody from Bengaluru. He said on both occasions when he was tied and beaten up, he had gone to meet his girlfriend. He had married the same woman who was his girlfriend, and had gone to Bengaluru to make a living.
Police struck his name off the list.
To the neighbor
The needle of suspicion turned to a man who was living on the banks of the canal, just 25 meters from the law student’s house. Circumstantial evidences were all against him. He had regularly fought with the family of the student over the suicide of his elder brother. His brother liked the student, but her mother opposed it. She had complained against him to the police and the district collector. The brother was called to the police station and, a few days later, found to have killed himself.
Police found a diary note of the student that said the neighbor had threatened to run a vehicle over her and her mother. The lead on this was given by the student’s classmates.
Investigators found to be incorrect the neighbor’s statement that he was asleep at the likely time of the murder and so didn’t hear any cries. Police also found that he was mentally unstable since his brother’s death and that there was a gap between his teeth. The dead student’s mother was once hit by a vehicle as well.
Police found also same types of liquor bottles near his house and behind the house of the student. The student’s mother and sister gave statements against him.
Previous enmity, circumstantial evidence, gap teeth and the statement of the student’s close relatives built up pressure on the police to arrest this man. But there weren’t any scientific evidence. And, he stood by his statement that he didn’t kill her.
More importantly, the DNA collected from the crime site and that of the suspect didn’t match. After five days of questioning, police let him off the hook. (Later, he was found to have committed suicide).
Caught in teeth gap
The bite mark found on the back of the student was seen as a crucial evidence. It was analyzed by an expert brought from Gujarat. The expert concluded that there was a gap between the murderer’s teeth. Using a photograph of the bite mark, a mold was made. Also, molds of the teeth of all the suspects were made and those were compared with that of the bite mark.
In fact, his teeth gap had nearly led to the arrest of a local laborer. Three women in the neighborhood told police that they found this man, wearing a yellow shirt, riding a bicycle on the road next to the student’s house on the day she was found dead. Police found that he was drunk that day. Moreover, there were similarities in the measurement of his teeth and the cuts found on the student’s body.
At that time, there was news that the suspect in the case was arrested.
This news came out two days before the assembly poll. The team probing the case was under tremendous pressure. Odontology experts argued the similarities were scientific evidence.
But, then came a question. The student’s body had the bite mark near the shoulder where the clothe is usually thicker. So, will a bite there leave the mark of the teeth similar to what it would be somewhere else in the body? Was there a gap between the teeth?
That was a turnaround. An opinion was sought from an odontology expert in Bengaluru. He said the impact of the bite could be different under different circumstances and in this case, it couldn’t be confirmed that there was a gap between the teeth.
This suspect’s name was dropped after his DNA test also came negative.
The police, in fact, got a lot of flak over their investigation around gap teeth. There were rumors that the measurement of the teeth was taken by making the suspects bite on a raw mango. In fact, it was done by asking the suspects to bite on a specially made mold and then applying a chemical on the mold to take the measurement.
Leader with gap teeth
As usual, politicians were dragged into the matter. Several colorful stories were made around a leader who had a space between his teeth. What had turned the fingers against him was a distorted information given by a local resident.
This person told the police about the young son of a local leader returning home from abroad three days before the murder and leaving for Bengaluru the day after. This local leader owned land next to that of the student and was said to be involved in a property dispute.
The person alleged that the local leader was a benami of one of the top political leaders in the state and that the student’s mother had worked at the top leader’s house as a laborer. He also narrated to police a purported fight between the student’s mother and this leader. He said the mother had hit this leader in the stomach with an iron rod and in retaliation he had killed her daughter by thrusting a rod into her stomach.
Investigations turned that way. Information about the dispute was factual and so was that on the return of the local leader’s son from abroad and his subsequent travel to Bengaluru.
Police got this information just a day before the election.
But the story changed once the police questioned the student’s mother. In fact, the altercation her daughter and she had was with the father of the same local resident who told the police about the leader. The man the student tried to attack with a rod was also that person’s father.
While the police removed the leader from the focus, news about his name figuring in the probe came in the media two weeks later.
Unfortunately, the leader whose name was dragged into this case had gap teeth. It was also true that the student’s mother had worked at his house as a laborer in the past.
Peeping tom
Next on the radar was the staff of a bus who had the habit of peeping into the rooms of women. He lived close to the student’s house and knew her. There were allegations that his constant peeping had led a girl to commit suicide.
When this man was called for questioning, he ran away after leaving the bus in the middle of the road. This caused more suspicion.
Police took him to custody and questioned. There were bruises on his body. He was previously in jail. But here too, DNA test came to the rescue.
Policeman who covered his face
There were allegations that a policeman with his face covered was taken to the place where the suspects were questioned. This also triggered a controversy that went on for days.
But who was he?
Police had taken the student’s former dance teacher into custody. This was after they found that his was the last call on her phone. While they were taking him, he took off his banian and covered his face with it.
Read more: Latest Kerala news | Kannur airport takes wings, inspection in January
