Neighbour's driver arrested for elderly woman's murder

New Delhi: A 51-year-old man was arrested for killing an elderly woman in Sarita Vihar in South East Delhi on November 17. Police claimed that around 15 days ago, the accused picked up a letter of the deceased from outside her house and on the pretext of giving the letter, he went to the victim's house and conducted a recce.

The police identified the accused as Mehboob, a resident of Madanpur Khadar, who killed the 73-year-old woman in Sarita Vihar area. The complainant Radha Krishan Pandey said that he came back home around 6:30 pm and found that someone had slit the throat of his wife Savitri Pandey. He further narrated that his son with the help of his neighbours rushed her to Apollo Hospital.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (South East) Chinmoy Biswal stated that during the investigation, the CCTV footages of more than 100 cameras of the area of Pocket-L, K, H, Janta Flats and Sarita Vihar were collected and minutely scrutinized. The maids, servants, drivers, electricians, sweepers, ironmen and vendors working in the pockets of Sarita Vihar, especially Pocket-L, were extensively examined. "Police secretly verified the conduct of past one month of the domestic helps who were there in the locality at the time of the offence," said DCP.

He further claimed that police teams re-examined them and on the basis of examination, they zeroed in on a driver who used to work at a neighbour's house.

"In order to earn quick money, he purchased a knife and planned to rob people wearing gold ornaments. He used to wake up early in the morning and would roam in the area of Sarita Vihar to rob any person who was on the morning walk but he met no one wearing expensive items," police said.

Police further claimed that the accused on the day of incident entered the house of the victim when she was alone and threatened her with a knife. He asked for all the money kept in the house but the elderly woman refused. Thereafter, the accused slit the throat of the woman and removed the gold chain, ear tops and bangles from her body. Meanwhile, he heard some noise outside the house and thought people were around.

Police claimed that without ransacking the house, he left with the gold jewellery and a jacket to hide the articles. He left the blood smeared knife there.

He could not take the articles outside the colony and kept the robbed jewellery at a nearby abandoned public toilet and went to the house of his owner. In the late evening, he took gold bangles from the stolen jewellery and on the next day went to a jewellery shop at Kotla Mubarakpur and sold the bangles.

DCP Biswal claimed that Mehboob used to believe that there would have been a lot of money and jewellery in the house of the target. Accordingly, he built up relationships with the victim. He intentionally left his helmet at their house and again returned to take a look at the house.

"Two days before the incident, he went to the deceased's house and on the pretext of some personal problem asked her to lend him one lakh rupees but the same was denied by the deceased," said DCP.