Former nurse assaults and robs 71-year-old woman in Salt Lake home
Times of India | 24 November 2024
123 Kolkata: A 71-year-old woman living alone in a flat at a residential complex in Salt Lake was throttled and injected with drugs by a caregiver who earlier worked at her place before looting gold and cash worth several lakhs from her home on Saturday.
Cops probing the case were quick to track him down by tracing his cell phone tower location and CCTV footage procured from within the complex and traffic cams.IPL 2025 mega auctionIPL Auction 2025 Live: KKR break bank for Venkatesh Iyer, Ashwin returns to CSKIPL 2025 Auction LIVE: Updated Full Team SquadsIPL Auction 2025: Who got whomHe was arrested by Saturday night, and cops are on the lookout for another person who accompanied him.
The incident happened around 8 am at cluster 11 of Purbachal Housing Complex in Salt Lake. The woman, Chhaya Sengupta, lived in a ground floor flat of N block alone since her husband died last month after suffering a cerebral attack.
Police said the assailant, Subhankar Mukherjee, used to stay 24 x 7 at the flat as a male nurse attending to Chhaya's husband after he suffered the cardiac arrest in June. "While working at the flat, he came to know the family used to keep a large chunk of cash and jewellery at home and hatched the plan. He left work in the last week of June and came back to loot the woman on Saturday, knowing that the woman's husband was dead and there was no one else at home," said a senior officer of Bidhannagar City Police.
Speaking to TOI, Chhaya Sengupta, a former principal of a govt-aided school in south Kolkata, said she recognised Mukherjee initially. "On Friday, I received a call from an unknown number. My internet service was down for a few days, and a mechanic was supposed to come. I thought it was a technician. The man didn't reveal his identity and didn't correct me when I addressed him as a technician and asked him to come the next morning," said Sengupta.
She said that on Saturday, the two persons came and introduced themselves as representatives of the internet service provider and entered the ground floor flat when she opened the door. "They pushed me to the bed, and one of them injected a needle into my left arm. I couldn't identify them as they wore masks. As I tried to scream, one of them gagged me and throttled my neck as I lost my sense. When I regained consciousness, I found the flat ransacked and cash and gold jewellery worth several lakhs missing from my wardrobes and almirahs. My cellphones were also missing," said Sengupta.
She woke up around 11 am and found the main door closed from outside. When she tried to call for help from the backdoor, a neighbour, Meghdeepa Sengupta, came to her rescue and called cops from Bidhannagar south police station.
Sengupta, after watching Mukherjee's photographs, said he worked as a male nurse between June 16 and June 22. "We fired him after his behaviour looked suspicious. He then threatened me before leaving," she said.
Police, while probing the case, said they got some quick leads and began tracking the woman's call records and found out their suspect. "We were able to arrest Mukherjee from his Baguiati home. He is a male nurse and has worked with multiple hospitals. He confessed his crime. We have recovered some money from him but are yet to recover the total stolen booty. The search is also on for the other criminal who accompanied him," said Bidhannagar ACP Sambiti Chakraborty.