PORT BLAIR: After failing to get any fresh lead on the body of an American preacher, who is believed to have been killed by the Sentinelese tribe in the North Sentinel Island in the Andamans, the local police obtained seven days’ custody of three of the seven people arrested in the case. The seven people, arrested under various sections, had earlier been sent to judicial remand.
The body of 27-year-old John Allen Chau was spotted by five fishermen on November 17. “They will be interrogated for leads on various aspects of the case, including the sequence of events and the sea route taken by five of the accused, all fishermen while ferrying Chau to the North Sentinel Island. We will also look to gather more information on the exact location where the victim got off the boat and the place where he was last seen,” Vijay Singh, Senior Superintendent of Police, South Andaman, told media persons on Friday.
Police said the journals, which the preacher wrote between November 14 and 16 before he was killed, would be examined for leads if any.“We’ll also try to ascertain if the victim had taken the help of local fishermen to venture to North Sentinel Island earlier. In order to get a clearer picture of the events that preceded his killing, we are sending another police team to of North Sentinel Island,” he said.
With the Sentinelese considered an untra-sensitive tribe, and, Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG), police are taking the help of anthropologists, academics, forest department officials and a local guide in its investigation and bid to retrieve the body, the SP said.
According to highly placed sources, a police team, which went to North Sentinel Island for a recce, returned on Friday afternoon without being able to locate the preacher’s body. It has emerged that Chau, along with his friend Alexander and another local resident, had cut a deal with five fishermen to drop him off near North Sentinel Island. They paid Rs 25,000 for a ride to the remote island, sources said.
According to one of the journals that Chau left behind, he went to the island to ‘introduce Jesus’ to Sentinelese people.