PEDDAPALLI: While the special team constituted to investigate the daylight murder of lawyer couple Gattu Vaman Rao and PV Nagamani, are also probing if there was laxity on the part of local police and also if they were aware that the two were going to be murdered, the officials have received information that Peddapalli ZP Chairman Putta Madhu went into hiding with the help of two police officials.
According to sources, soon after the investigating officials decided to pick Madhu up for questioning, two police officers leaked the information to the Peddapalli ZP Chairman, after which the latter went into hiding for almost nine days.
It may be recalled that Madhu went into hiding on April 29 and was detained from a hotel room in Bhimavaram, Andhra Pradesh, only on May 7.
Sources told Express that while one of the officials, who helped Madhu, works at the Ramagundam commissionerate headquarters, the other one used to work as an SI at one of the stations in Manthani circle, but was recently transferred to another place.Though the investigating officials have not decided as to what to do with the officers who helped Madhu, they are constantly monitoring the movement of the latter.
In the meantime, though the ZP chief was released on May 10 after four days of questioning, the police are still frequently calling him for quizzing to extract more information. Sources told Express that Madhu has, till date, not skipped even a single session of questioning.It is learnt that the investigating officials are leaving no stone unturned to get maximum information from Madhu, so that they can finally register a case against him.
As for the probe into the gory murder of the HC lawyer couple, seven accused persons, including Kunta Srinivas, are currently in judicial custody at the Warangal prison. The court has so far recorded the statements of about 120 witnesses. While closely monitoring the case, the High Court recently expressed its satisfaction over the ongoing probe.According to sources, the officials are contemplating to file a chargesheet in the court by May 20.