Jisha murder case: Accused gave victim alcohol after she asked for water

In a major breakthrough in the Jisha murder and rape case, the Kerala police have made their first arrest two days ago in Kochi. According to OnManorama, the suspect, who is a migrant worker from Assam, has confessed to committing the gruesome murder of the law student in Perumbavoor. Reacting to reports that the accused, Amir Ul Islam, a migrant labourer from Assam, had been nabbed by the Special Investigation team, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said, “Investigation team has received full information about the accused. From Wednesday onwards, the accused was under police radar.” Praising the efforts of the Kerala police, he said, “The people of Kerala were waiting for such a news. The development is a feather in the cap of Kerala Police.” The Chief Minister also tweeted:

One suspect has been taken into police custody in connection with the Kerala student rape and murder case, says Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan

— ANI (@ANI) June 16, 2016

[caption id=“attachment_2837726” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image. Getty Images[/caption] Sources stated by The New Indian Express, said that four friends of the suspect have also been detained. Even as OnManorama reported that the DNA results have confirmed that Islam is Jisha’s killer, PTI says that the 23-year-old’s arrest is expected to be recorded on Thursday, only after which his DNA samples will be taken. Reports by CNN News18 said that Jisha had rejected sexual advances from the suspect, earlier on the same day that she was killed. According to a report by Manorama Online, Jisha tried to resist the accused’s attempts to rape her, after which she sustained injuries. Later, when she asked for water, the accused gave her alcohol. Last week, police had secured CCTV camera details from a shop from the victim’s neighbourhood, which reportedly showed the suspect following the law student in the neighbourhood of her residence, hours ahead of the incident on 28 April. “We have secured the CCTV camera details from the shop hoping that it might have captured visuals of the suspected killer,” a senior police official probing the case said. According to the reports, CCTV evidence secured from the fertiliser depot showed a man wearing a yellow T shirt following a woman, believed to be the victim, who was on her way home after getting down from a bus at Vattolippady near Perumbavoor around 1.30 pm that day. “It is not sure whether the people found in the footage are related to the incident,” the official had told PTI. Meanwhile, the owner of the fertiliser depot, Shibu, had told reporters that the police probing the case took the hard disc of the CCTV footage on Wednesday. Newly appointed Kerala police chief Loknath Behera, while visiting the house of the 30-year-old woman on Sunday, had said a scientific probe has been launched to nab the culprits involved in the crime. Noting that the probe into the sensational case was progressing well, he had said it might take some time to nab the criminals. The case is being investigated by a team headed by ADGP B Sandhya. The newly sworn-in LDF government in one of its first decisions had appointed the senior woman IPS officer as head of the new team to probe the case. The Kerala High Court had last week rejected the plea for a CBI probe into the case, noting that the new Special Investigation Team had been set up in the case. The woman, who hailed from a poor family, was allegedly raped and brutally assaulted using sharp-edged weapons before being murdered at her house on 28 April. The murder was in focus during the 16 May Kerala Assembly poll campaigns with political parties attacking the then UDF regime for “tardy” progress in the investigation and its failure to nab the culprits. With inputs from PTI