After 17 years, the Crime Branch has produced a suspect in the murder of a 50-year-old woman at Pullad near Thiruvalla in the Pathanamthitta district. And it is the husband of the victim.
The Crime Branch that reopened the case says that Remadevi (50) was murdered by her husband Janardhanan Nair.
The investigators claim that forensic findings -- that had, mysteriously, remained submerged for nearly 13 years -- point in the direction of Nair.
He was arrested by a team led by Crime Branch Detective Inspector Sunil Raj. According to reports, Nair has confessed to the crime.
Remadevi was found dead inside her house on May 26, 2006, with a cut on her neck. The police had found 40 strands of hair -- 36 in one hand and 4 in another -- on the victim's body.
The post-mortem report said that a sharp object similar to a sword was used in the murder.
It took four years for the report on the samples to come out. But meantime, the case had gone cold.
Initially, the suspect was someone else; a guest worker from Tamil Nadu who resided nearby. The police had questioned construction workers in the locality and learned that the Tamilian went missing a day after the murder of Remadevi.
The probe went that way, but the suspect, and a woman, who stayed with him, could not be traced. A brother of Janardhanan Nair was a suspect in another murder case and the cops also looked in that direction.
Interestingly, it was Nair who approached the High Court demanding a Crime Branch probe as he expressed dissatisfaction with the investigation done by the local police.
People from the area have demanded a probe into the surprise turn of events in the murder case.
