Daijiworld Media Network - Kolar (SP)
Kolar, Apr 28: 'Majestic Raja' and three of his gang members, who used to specifically target cab drivers for abduction and robbery, have been awarded life sentences by a court in KGF in the district. Raja, and his three associates, Venkatesh Murthy from Doddaballapur, Raghu from Krishnagiri, and Pratap from Chikkaballapur, were handed down life sentence by the third additional district and sessions judge at KGF, M Jagadeeshwara. They have also been fined Rs 20,000 each.
Another murder-accused in this case is still at large. He has been identified as Vasu.
The gang had stopped the car driven by Krishna from Electronic City here on November 25, 2011, and sought to be dropped at Bommanahalli. They later kidnapped Krishna, led him to Berike in Tamil Nadu, where he was killed by tightening a wire around Krishna's neck. The corpse was then thrown into a 60-feet pit inside the forest area that falls under Kamasamudra police station limits. The gang had taken away cash, wrist watch and cellphone found on Krishna's body.
This murder case was registered in Kamasamudra police station. Kolar district superintendent of police had formed a team to investigate this murder. When Bengaluru police arrested the accused in 2013 relating to another case, they came to know that they had murdered Krishna.
Kamasamudra police thereafter took the members into custody and filed charge sheet in the court. After the hearing which went on for six years, the judge found the accused guilty of the offence and pronounced judgement on Thursday.
The gang had become a nightmare for police departments of three neighbouring states where several crimes were committed. Although the then city police commissioner, Shankar Bidari, had formed three separate teams for the specific mission of arresting this gang, there was no success. The gang, which had remained elusive for long, was arrested accidentally and police were surprised by the outcome of their interrogation that the 'petty gang' which they had arrested for shielding sex workers, was in fact the one involved with 30 cases of abduction, robbery, and murder, mainly of cab drivers of several IT companies.