The accused with the stolen SUV
After failing to crack a two-and-half-month-old carjacking case, the Central Crime Branch (CCB) sleuths got help from a call girl and managed to arrest the two felons involved in the case. According to the police, the duo - comprising Deepak Kishore alias Dhanraj, who is a habitual offender, and his associate Mohammed Mursalin Pasha - rented a car on the pretext of taking a family trip to Murudeshwar from Hubli, but they had other plans on their minds.
Before leaving to Hubli, they hired a call girl from Bangalore and took her along to pose as the wife of one of the men. The agent at the counter in Ganesh Tours and Travels gave the trio an SUV along with a driver and the group proceeded to Hubli.
Long haltOn July 31, the duo asked the cab driver to halt for a break near Sagar town, after which they clubbed him with an iron rod and left him bleeding profusely on the roadside before fleeing. The driver suffered head injuries and had lost a lot of blood, but survived after some passers-by found him and informed the police.
Meanwhile, the call girl who accompanied the treacherous duo was threatened with dire consequences and paid some cash to keep the incident a secret.
However, the girl tipped off the CCB sleuths after she was dropped off in the city by the duo and even gave them the mobile number of one of the accused, which helped the cops in tracking them down eventually.
End of the roadBased on the call records, a CCB team headed by ACP B N Nyame Gowda nabbed the accused and seized the car. "The accused had procured forged documents of the car and changed the registration number and were looking to sell it to a prospective client," Gowda said.
The plan to waylay the cab driver and steal the vehicle was hatched by Dhanraj. Originally a native of Ankola in North Canara, he had relocated to the city after incurring losses in his second hand car-dealing business.