2010 Kurla minor rape, murder: How the cops found the needle in the haystack

Finding themselves on the back foot after recovering the body of the third minor to be raped and murdered in a span of four months in a locality in Kurla in 2010 the Nehru Nagar police fought an uphill battle while investigating the crimes culminating in the sentencing of 24yearold Javed Shaikh yesterdayWith the needle of suspicion pointing even to the senior police inspector of their own police station and his son mdash since the second body was found from the terrace of the building where they lived see box below mdash Nehru Nagar police officials cast the net wide scrutinised the call data of thousands and questioned and took the DNA samples of scores of peopleIt took all this for the police to finally zero in on Shaikh mdash a cable operator who was 19 at the time mdash for the rape and murder of the 9yearold the third victim whose body was found in a deserted shanty in the area on June 19 2010Shaikh was finally arrested on July 1 and sentenced to life imprisonment yesterday The other two cases in which the bodies of another nineyearold and a sixyearold mdash who were also raped and murdered mdash were found in March 2010 and February 2010 respectively still remain unsolvedProbeAfter the third rape and murder case involving a minor in a span of four months was registered on June 19 2010 the Nehru Nagar police found it difficult to investigate as an atmosphere of sheer tension and panic prevailed Cops didnrsquot have any clue whom to believe as their own senior police and his son were considered suspects in one of the casesRecalling the probe to midday yesterday an officer who was part of the investigating team said the third case was registered with the police station on June 19 when the nineyearold girlrsquos body was found in a deserted shanty They started investigating very minutely and believed that they would get some leads in the third caseldquoWe could find some hair samples which we believed to be of the accused and other samples from the body of the deceased which proved very crucial for the case as these were immediately sent for DNA analysis After this we started narrowing down on the people roaming around the shanty on June 6 when the girl who had gone missing the same day was raped and murderedrdquoWide netThe call data of thousands of mobile users was scrutinised Scores of people who were found near the shanty on the day of the murder were summoned to the police stationThe investigators subjected each one of them to several rounds of questioning but with no leads emerging they decided to collect the DNA samples of all of them which were later sent for forensic tests to be matched with the samples that were found on the victimrsquos bodyldquoNot a single person was spared We had even rounded up people engaged in doortodoor marketing newspaper milk and vegetable vendors and others who had gone near the scene of crime Cable operator Javed Shaikh was among those whose samples were takenrdquo said an officer from the investigating teamItrsquos a matchldquoAfter we received the reports from the laboratory around June 24 Shaikhrsquos DNA matched 100 to the DNA found on the nineyearold girl who was the third victim So we sent a team and nabbed him He was produced in court and we got police custody for 14 days beginning July 2Initially he kept denying the crime But later as we investigated and interrogated him he confessed to the crime on the fifth day of his police custody mdash July 6 mdash and took us to the spotrdquo said the officer Following this Shaikh even gave the cops the chronological order of the events that took place on the day of the rape and murderldquoWe then started collecting evidence from the spot and later even got three eyewitnesses in the case which proved vital The statements of a rickshaw driver mdash who had dropped Shaikh in the area mdash a maid and an officegoer made this case very strong and helped us seek convictionrdquo said the officer