MANGALURU: In a major breakthrough, the Mangaluru city police have arrested six people in connection with the recent murder of Mohammed Fazil in Suratkal.
Mohammed Fazil, a resident of Mangalpet in Suratkal, was murdered by three people with lethal weapons. Neither the identity of the killers nor the motive was known. Two days ago, the police had arrested Ajith Crasta who had hired out his car to the killers, from whom they got some leads.
The six who were arrested on Tuesday are history-sheeter Suhas Shetty, Mohan alias Nepali Mohan, Giridhar, Abhishek, Dixit and Srinivas.
According to Mangaluru City Police Commissioner N Shashikumar, prima facie, Fazil’s murder seems to be to avenge Praveen Nettaru’s death. On July 26, Praveen was murdered and it was rumoured that activists of a particular organisation were involved.
That night, Suhas Shetty decided that a Muslim should be killed. The next day, Suhas and his associates hatched a plan and prepared a list of Muslim youth living around Suratkal. They finally picked on Fazil as he was quite active and was an easy target. They hired Crasta’s Hyundai Eon car for Rs 15,000 for three days, gathered lethal weapons, bought monkeycaps on July 27 and killed Fazil the next day.
After committing the murder, the killers abandoned Crasta’s car midway and fled in a friend’s car. They were on the run for the last few days and were finally nabbed by the police at Udyavara in Udupi on Tuesday.