The death toll in a serial murder case that has shocked India may top 40 after detectives found over a dozen more skulls stashed in plastic bags, a report said yesterday.
"In the 40 bags, we have found more than a dozen skulls," an unnamed senior official of the federal Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) told the Hindustan Times newspaper.
"Apart from this, the other human remains found in the bags indicate that the death toll could cross 40," the official said.
PHOTO: AFP
The CBI declined to confirm the figures officially, but said in a statement that "biomaterials" in more than 40 polythene bags were recovered from the drain in front of the house of the two men accused of the lurid crimes.
"The seized materials have been sent to the laboratory for post mortem," the federal agency said in a statement posted on its Web site on Monday.
Local police say at least 17 people, mostly children, have been confirmed murdered in the area outside New Delhi. The CBI said it had so far registered 19 various cases of kidnapping, rape and murder of children and women.
The new finds have been made in the past three days around a bungalow that the media has dubbed the "House of Horrors," where the main suspects -- affluent businessman Moninder Singh Pander and servant Surender Koli -- lived.
The gruesome details of the murders have shocked India.
Koli has reportedly admitted under interrogation that he raped children as young as three, had sex with the corpses of his victims and once tried to eat human organs, believing cannibalism cured impotency.
Police were earlier investigating if the murders had been committed so that organs such as kidneys could be sold off, as the torsos of the victims appeared to be missing.
According to the media, the plastic bags contained torsos as well. The CBI, however, did not say whether it would continue probing the organs trade angle.
The CBI official told the Hindustan Times that the latest discoveries had been made on the basis of information the suspects gave to their interrogators under the influence of sodium penthanol, or so-called "truth serum."
Most of the remains have been found in a sewage drain around the house. The CBI was using heavy machinery to clean up the area.
Agency detectives swooped down yesterday at the businessman's sprawling warehouse in the industrial Noida district to search for more clues, witnesses said.
The detectives also dug up a section inside the businessman's house, police said.
Residents of the village of Nithari, where most of the victims came from, say up to 38 children went missing over the past three years, but their pleas were ignored by local police because they were poor.
Under fire from politicians and the media, six policemen were sacked, three suspended for neglect and the investigations transferred to the CBI.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of
A prominent Christian leader has allegedly been stabbed at the altar during a Mass yesterday in southwest Sydney. Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was saying Mass at Christ The Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley just after 7pm when a man approached him at the altar and allegedly stabbed toward his head multiple times. A live stream of the Mass shows the congregation swarm forward toward Emmanuel before it was cut off. The church leader gained prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic, amassing a large online following, Officers attached to Fairfield City police area command attended a location on Welcome Street, Wakeley following reports a number