Kochi: The cops probing Perumbavoor rape and murder case on Thursday refused to confirm that the Dalit girl was drugged before being subjected to brutal attack on April 28 even as the reconstituted Special Investigation Team led by ADGP B Sandhya is expected to focus on the "friendly intruder" at her house on the fateful day.
“It's true the victim had consumed food brought from outside just hours before she was murdered. A chemical test on the residue of food from her internal organs led us to this conclusion. Naturally chemicals will be formed as part of the digestion and we can't say this points her being drugged," said sources.
Muraleedharan Nair, Chief Chemical Examiner of the Kakkanad Regional Chemical Examiner's Laboratory, denied that the test of internal organs revealed about drugging of the victim. "The reports in this regard are false. In fact, the chemical test was done at the Thiruvananthapuram laboratory and not here," he said.
Despite claims of "getting close to a breakthrough", the cops are yet to find out the perpetrator even nearly a month after the heinous crime. The job of the new team would not be easier given that the cops have messed up with evidence collection during the initial stage of the probe.
Even the Police Complaint Authority Chairperson Justice Narayana Kurup observed that the police should have cordoned off the crime scene just after the incident. "Instead people were seen coming in and out of the premises of the victim's house and the cops finally did it five days after the crime. By that time, they might have lost crucial evidences," Kurup charged.
The nod given by the cops to cremate the victim's body in a rush soon after autopsy as well as the "failure" to videograph the postmortem too came in for criticism. Meanwhile, UDF convenor P P Thankachan denied the allegation linking him with the murder and sought a probe into the intentions of activist Jomon Puthenpurackal who raised the charges.
Thankachan said the allegation that Jisha's mother Rajeswari had worked as maid in his house was baseless. He also warned of initiating legal action against Jomon for raising "baseless allegations".
