In a significant breakthrough, Sivagiri police on Monday arrested a fourth person in connection with the brutal double murder of an elderly couple in the Megarian Thottam area. The victims, Ramasamy and Bakkiyammal, were found dead at their farmhouse on May 2. Investigations revealed they were killed on April 28 for their gold ornaments weighing 10 sovereigns.
The arrested individuals are Achiyappan, Matheswaran, and Ramesh—all residents of Arachalur—who directly committed the murder, and Gnanasekaran, a 40-year-old pawn shop owner from Chennimalai, who helped melt the stolen gold. With Gnanasekaran’s arrest, the total number of arrests in the case has reached four.
According to Inspector General T. Senthil Kumar (Coimbatore West Zone), the trio used the wooden handles of spades to bludgeon the couple to death before fleeing with their valuables. Police recovered 10 grams of gold, Ramasamy’s mobile phone, three motorcycles, two wooden handles, and gloves used in the crime.
In a chilling revelation, the suspects also confessed to a triple murder in Palladam, Tirupur district, in November last year. They allegedly murdered another elderly couple and their son, stealing 5.5 sovereigns of gold and a mobile phone.
Twelve special police teams, led by DIG V. Sasi Mohan and SP A. Sujatha, were deployed to investigate the case. Using CCTV footage, forensic evidence including matching footprints, and detailed field surveillance, police identified and apprehended the suspects.
“The case was cracked through painstaking analysis of video footage from April 28 to 30 and postmortem timelines,” said IG Kumar. “All three primary suspects had prior arrests for burglary in 2015.”