CHENNAI: City police are investigating if the suspect in the recent rape of a college girl who was picked up on the East Coast Road had carried out similar sexual assaults in the past.
Since many such assaults go unreported, police are exploring all possibilities relating to the suspect.
In the recent sexual assault, a college student, who went to Akkarai Beach in East Coast Road with her boyfriend on Monday, was picked up by a man posing as a police officer. She was taken by the accused in a bike to his house at Sholinganallur where she was sexually assaulted. The girl later filed a complaint at the Semmenchery police station.
Police suspect he could have carried out similar assaults with young girls coming alone or with their male friends.
“He did not leave the city on Monday soon after committing the offence. But only on Tuesday after the girl had lodged a complaint and newspapers carried the news about the incident. So it is suspected he was confident of going scot-free possibly with many such abuses going unreported. Only after coming to know that the girl had complained to the police, he became nervous and left the city,” said a police source.
However, a police officer said that it will be difficult to prove other such cases given that many of the victims will be unwilling to come forward and lodge a complaint even after several days have elapsed.
The suspect, S Bharathiraja, alias Arunmozhi, 29, is a father of an 8-month-old girl child and his wife is living in his native village in Cuddalore district. He has a PhD in Pharmacy and was working in an MNC in an IT company at OMR. The police arrested him within a week of the sexual assault.