KASARAGOD: Venom, the archrival of Spider Man, is the WhatsApp profile picture of 22-year-old Albin Benny. The Marvel character's drooling grin is popular with fans, and children sport T-shirts declaring 'We are Venom' to flaunt their love for the villain or anti-hero, depending on who he is fighting. But when one is arrested for poisoning one's sister to death and nearly killing his parents, there are no two ways of looking at the tongue-lashing, teeth baring Venom. "Haven't you seen his profile picture? He has put up an image of the devil," said Albin's neighbour and a friend of his mother Bessy.
On Thursday, Vellarikkundu police arrested Albin for murdering his 16-year-old sister Ann Mary by spiking ice-cream with rat poison. After battling for life for five days, she died on August 5.
Their father Benny Olikkal is in critical condition after suffering 80 per cent liver damage. He may not survive without a liver transplant. Bessy has recovered but is still in the hospital. Police said he did it to usurp the four-acre property of his father.
"We just cannot believe this happened to Benny's family. It is inconceivable that Albin did it. When they fell ill, we thought it was a case of food poisoning," said Madhavan Nair, 64, their neighbour and member of the Athikkadavu ward of Balal panchayat.
'He kept to himself'
On Friday, when the Vellarikkundu inspector brought Albin to his house at Arinkallu, neighbours gathered around demanding severe punishment for him. They also shouted that he was addicted to marijuana. "But before this incident, no one had said that about him. He never showed a violent trait," said Nair.He said Albin always kept to himself. "He did not have many friends. Now I am told he has a lot of phone friends," he said.The father and son did not get along because Albin always found reasons to skulk work on the fields, he said.
'Contempt for farm job'
Albin is the eldest son of Benny Olikkal and Bessy. The couple's second son is studying at a seminary in Wayanad. When Albin was in school, he was an altar boy at the St Antony's Church in Balal, which is the parish church, said Tomy Vattackattu from neighbouring Kallanchira ward.After Class XII, Albin too had joined a seminary but he dropped out after a year, said Nair.
"He left the seminary because as part of the curriculum he had to work in the farm which he did not like," said Pradeesh Gopal, a Cyber police officer, who is part of the investigating team.Later, he worked in vegetable shops and a bakery in Vellarikkundu, Tomy said. "We never talked to him because he always kept to himself and did not like to converse," Tomy said.Albin might have changed when he went to Kottayam to pursue a one-year ITI course."
After he left Balal, he made a lot of friends and he had only minimum contact with his family," said Gopal.After the course, he told his family that he was going to join a car showroom in Kumily. "But that is not where he went," he said.Instead Albin worked as a waiter at a friend's restaurant near Gudalur in Nilgiris district of Tamil Nadu. When he was in Gudalur, Benny had sent him money to buy a mobile phone.
Came home during lockdown
When the country was locked down, the restaurant business took a hit and he had to return. "He returned home very reluctantly. He did not like his house nor was he attached to his family members," said Gopal. Back home, the mobile phone kept him busy.Benny tapped the rubber trees in the morning and used to go to Vellarikkundu town to collect vegetable waste for pigs of his farm. Bessy would collect the rubber latex. The couple did not hire farmhands but managed the 16 pigs on their own. Besides, the husband and wife ran a poultry farm.. "They worked hard. If Benny had any free time, he would go to cut grass on other people's property. He used to earn Rs 200 per hour. I have never seen Benny sitting idle," said Nair. Albin hated all this and wanted to flee the village.
Made advances towards sister
At home during the lockdown, police said Albin made advances towards his sister. She threatened to tell their mother of the unwarranted advances and Albin backed off, said Gopal. The officer said this was disclosed by Albin during interrogation. Albin had an affair with a distant relative and the girl broached the matter with her father.
"But the father told the girl that he would never allow her to marry into the Olikkal family. This might have given him another reason to loathe his family," said Gopal. The police, however, said they found it hard to believe he had built up enough hate to attempt to eliminate his family. On July 30, he asked his sister and mother to make ice-cream.
After having the bourbon ice-cream in the evening, he allegedly mixed rat poison in the remaining ice-cream, which the father and daughter had the following day. They never recovered from the venom.