TURA: Assam police with the help of their counterparts from Tura have apprehended the ring leader of a gang involved in lifting vehicles from Garo Hills including one in which the driver was brutally murdered and his body dumped in a forest area on the Kherapara-Dalu road, last month.
Following inputs from West Garo Hills police, a team of Assam police from Mankachar picked up Ahmed Hussain alias Ali from Kalapani village on Friday. He is believed to be the leader of the gang which has been involved in a string of car lifting cases Garo Hills.
From his possession, police have retrieved the mobile phone of the Mahindra-Pik Up driver who was murdered on the Kherapara-Dalu road. He has since been handed over to Meghalaya police.
It may be recalled that the Mahindra Pik Up mini truck was hired by unidentified men from Tura in the first week of June and taken to Dalu. En route the driver was murdered and the vehicle stolen. The same vehicle was later used by a criminal gang involving former militants to abduct and murder a trader from Nazing Bazar weekly market. Following the arrest of the criminal gang and recovery of the decomposed body of the murdered trader from Allotgre area, the kingpin, Ali, shifted the vehicle to Kalapani village in Mankachar where they were in the process on changing the Chassis number and other parts of the vehicle to avoid detection when police swooped down on the garage and retrieved the vehicle. The owner of the garage has also been taken into custody.
Police are now in the process of interrogating the arrested kingpin to piece together the sequence of events connecting the vehicle theft and its use in the abduction and murder of the driver and the trader.