The gut feeling of the policemen has proved right with the arrest of two persons on Thursday in connection with the murder of a 65-year-old retired nurse of Railway Hospital at her home in Abidnagar, Akkayyapalem.
The retired nurse, Battiprolu Andalamma, was brutally strangulated to death and robbed of all the gold she was wearing on Monday night.
On the same night, the city was rocked with the murder of another 70-year-old woman, Hafiz Unnissa. The killers of Hafiz Unnissa were caught within a couple of hours and produced before the media on Tuesday.
Commissioner of Police Amit Garg had expressed that Andalamma was also killed by persons known to her as in the case of Hafiz Unnissa. And it proved right as one of the accused happened to be a person known to her and who was staying opposite her house.
Piradi Dhana Raju (32), who lives opposite the victim’s house, hatched a plot with Urla Satish (20) to eliminate Andalamma. Dhana Raju, a regular visitor to Andalamma’s house, assured her of getting her sofa set repaired and even discussed an investment plan, as the retired nurse wanted to invest in some real estate property, said Deputy Commissioner of Police (crime) T. Ravi Kumar Murthy.
Dhana Raju who deals with sale of second hand cell phones befriended Satish, an autorickshaw driver, who is listed as rowdy sheeter under the Fourth Town Police Station limits. Both the accused hatched the plot on April 7 and their first attempt on April 12 proved futile. But on April 13, Dhana Raju moved inside the house at about 8 p.m. and dragged the victim to the bedroom where Satish strangulated her to death, after locking the front door.
“In the meantime, her maidservant pressed the calling bell and in panic, they quickly removed all the gold that the victim was wearing and left through the kitchen back door. Finding the door locked from inside the maid raised an alarm and neighbours called the police,” said the DCP.
Two persons have been arrested in connection with the killing of a retired nurse