A 27-year-old woman has been accused of killing her 4-year-old neighbor to steal his gold chain and then proceeding to stuff his body in her closet in Kanyakumari, Tamil Nadu. India on Friday, Jan. 21.
On Friday, Fathima, 27, who resides near the house of the four-year-old victim Johan, allegedly lured Johan into her house and murdered the boy to steal his gold jewelry. After killing the boy, Fathima tied his corpse and stuffed the remains in her closet to hide it, the Times Of India reported.
Johan was last seen alive playing with other children on the road near his house on Friday afternoon, Jan. 21, before he suddenly went missing. The boy's relatives and concerned villagers searched for him till late in the night. However, when they couldn’t find him, they began circulating his photographs on social media as his parents lodged a police complaint.
When the authorities started their investigation into the disappearance, they narrowed down their suspicion to four people including Fathima. The suspect had reportedly borrowed money from many of her neighbors and was struggling to repay her debts.
When she was finally picked up for questioning, she furiously claimed that she was innocent. However, locals suspected that the boy could be in her house and barged into her residence along with the police. After looking around, they found the boy dead with his mouth gagged and limbs tied inside her closet, Times Now reported.
The 4-year-old victim, Johan, was the elder son of Richard, 35, and Silja, 31. Since Richard was working abroad, the boy was under the sole care of Silja, who gave birth to a girl child just last month. Meanwhile, Fathima lived in her own house with her husband and two children near the victim's address.
According to the police, Johan, who was playing with his friends in front of Fathima’s house, walked into her home when she called him in. However, when Fathima snatched his gold chain, the victim tried to raise his voice to call for help. The woman immediately gagged him to make him quiet. After realizing that the boy had died, she tied him and hid the body in her closet.
"She confessed to the crime only after the body was retrieved from her house," the Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP), P Thanga Raman, said.
Meanwhile, the officers are probing the incident to see if her relative or anyone else had a role in the crime.
"We have altered the missing case registered by Manavalakurichi police to a case of murder and arrested Fathima," Raman said.
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