Bengaluru: The Bengaluru police accidentally happened to arrest three supari killers, on Saturday and thus foiled a murder plot while hunting for a stolen SUV.
Acting on a complaint lodged by Pedanna (55) the police had launched a search operation for the trio who had assaulted Pedanna and made away with his Mahendra Xylo vehicle on Wednesday night. On Saturday, a patrol team was able to identify the stolen vehicle as it was plying on NICE Road near Thalaghattapura. They swept into action and arrested the trio – Mani alias Konga, 30, of Kempanayakanahalli, Roopesh M, 33, of Jambusavari Dinne and Selvaraju K, 33, of Mylasandra near Begur – after intercepting the vehicle.
It was during the course of the investigation that the police stumbled upon the murder plot. As per the confessions made by the arrested, they had stolen the vehicle to execute a murder plot for which they had taken supari. Reportedly, Lakshman, a financer by profession had offered the trio a sum of Rs 3 lacs to murder Shivakumar, a beeda stall owner at Arakere since he suspected that the latter was in an illicit relationship with his wife. He had even given them an initial advance of Rs 7000 to execute the plan.
The police have also arrested Lakshman after coming to know of the plan.
“Lakshman suspected that Shivakumar and his wife were into a relationship. Moreover, after his wife started staying separately, Lakshman felt that Kumar was responsible for the marital discord between them and hence hired contract killers. Since the gang needed a vehicle to execute their abduction and murder plan, they had stolen Pedanna’s vehicle,” said a police officer.
The four accused were produced before the court on Friday and remanded in judicial custody.
