They pelted stones, snatched our pistols: Telangana Police on encounter of rape accused

Hyderabad: Divulging details of the 'encounter' of all four accused in the rape and murder of a 27-year-old woman Hyderabad veterinary doctor, Cyberabad Police Commissioner V C Sajjanar on Friday said his men resorted to 'retaliatory' firing after two of the accused opened fire at the police after snatching two pistols from them.

Addressing a press conference, Sajjanar said the accused during the interrogation had confessed hiding the cell phone and other belongings of the victim near the spot where they had burnt the body under the under-construction bridge at Chattapally, 30 km from Hyderabad.

"Based on that we had taken them to the spot to search for the cell phone at 5.45 am. However, they tried to mislead the police and wandered around. Suddenly, one of the accused started pelting stones at police officers. After that, the remaining accused then picked up sticks and stones and began to throw at the police escort," Sajjaner said, adding that two policemen sustained head injuries.

"We gave them a chance to surrender but they fired and police retaliated. After the firing stopped we found that all four accused were found dead," he said, adding that "all this happened within 5 or 10 minutes."

Calling the dead accused "very tough with a criminal bent of mind", Sajjaner said the accused managed to attack despite ten armed police officials escorting them.

The Cyberabad Police Commissioner said that the four accused were not handcuffed at that time as they were asked to search for the belongings of the veterinary doctor, which they claimed they had hidden there. He also said that all the weapons carried by cops were unlocked as the accused were considered dangerous and that is why they could open fire.

Sajjanar also said that the police did not make a video of the crime scene reconstruction. He further said that the police is collecting information about unsolved cases of missing women, burnt unidentified bodies of women and suspected rape and murder cases from Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and other parts of Telangana.

"We suspect that these four were habitual offenders and could have committed similar crimes in other states," Sajjanar said.

(Inputs from The Indian Express)