KOCHI: There are sensational cases with which the police, despite cracking the entire plot, cannot proceed further as victims refuse to proceed with the case. In one such recent incident, the police even managed to nab the person who stole 560 grams of gold while working as the manager of a financial firm but were forced to close the case as the company decided not to proceed with the investigation.
On February 15, 28-year-old Rajesh reached the Muvattupuzha police station complaining that his brother Ramesh, working as a manager with a gold finance company, was attacked by two bike-borne robbers who threw chilli powder on his face. Without wasting any time, a police team rushed to their house to meet Ramesh.
“First, we registered a robbery case based on the statement given by Rajesh. Then, we met Ramesh. But he didn’t complain of any injury as narrated by his brother. Ramesh said he had discomfort as chilli powder was sprinkled in his eyes. Thereafter, we reached the crime scene to check for any clue regarding the persons involved,” a police officer who was part of the investigation told TNIE.
According to the brothers’ statements, the incident took place on a road near the Thrikka temple in Velloorkunnam.
“The victim’s scooter was parked on the roadside with traces of chilli powder on it. Ramesh told us he was returning from another gold finance firm after his company procured 560 grams of gold ornaments auctioned by the firm. He said the gold ornaments were kept in the laptop bag which the robbers managed to grab from him after throwing chilli powder,” the police officer said.
Soon the news spread like wildfire and reports appeared on news channels. The report about the heist even found place on the front page of a newspaper.
“It was a major heist of its kind in recent years in these areas. There was nothing suspicious at the crime scene. It looked like a robbery attempt actually took place,” he said.
The first move by the police was to identify the vehicle of the persons involved in the heist. “The identification of the vehicle is crucial in such cases. So our team checked the CCTV footage on the entire stretch. We were told the incident took place around 12.30pm. But despite checking the CCTV footage of vehicles passing through the stretch from 11am to 2pm, no vehicle as described by Ramesh could be found. This time, we also checked mobile phones registered at mobile phone towers nearby. But that attempt too turned futile,” the officer said.
Thus, the police team decided to resort to the traditional method of investigation, that of asking residents and shopkeepers regarding any vehicles that might have passed through the area in a suspicious manner. But nobody could recollect any such two-wheeler. The police then checked for persons arrested for similar thefts in recent years but failed to detect any trace of these persons anywhere near the crime scene.
“We checked whether Ramesh visited the finance firm to procure the gold ornaments and found the claim to be true. Similarly, we also checked his mobile phone and nothing suspicious emerged,” the officer said.
The investigation hit a dead end. The robbers had left no clue. Thus the police decided to record Ramesh’s statement again.
“The idea was to find any new information that could help us trace the accused. In the second interaction, factual differences started to emerge. Thus we switched to interrogation mode. Finally, he confessed that it was a cooked-up heist story,” the officer said.
Ramesh said he faked the heist as he was under severe financial constraints. Gold worth Rs 20 lakh was found in his office and an additional `6-lakh worth of gold ornaments were traced from a place near the temple. But despite toiling for over 24 hours, the police had to close the case as the finance company where Ramesh worked, and which owned the stolen gold, decided to not proceed with the investigation.
“They told us that they had no complaints. The FIR we registered was based on Rajesh’s complaint. It would not stand in the court during trial. Thus we had no other way but to end the probe despite the accused being in our hands. Such cases are common in the police department. Recently, a person abducted refused to give a complaint even after we managed to free him from the abductors,” the officer said.
Some names have been changed as the case is closed
Gold heist
Recently, Rajesh approached the Muvattupuzha police station complaining that his brother Ramesh was attacked by two robbers and then stole 560 grams of gold. In a while, the news spread like wildfire and reports appeared on news channels. However, the case has been closed for a while though the police identified the criminal.
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