Mumbai, August 27: A 23-year-old housemaid who carried out several robberies in the western suburbs was arrested by the Goregaon police.
After collecting a huge sum, Neelam Verma went to seek blessings at the Vaishnodevi temple with her husband. She was arrested last week soon after she returned to the city to begin her spree.
The police had a tough time finding the accused as Verma worked under different names for different employers. According to the police, Verma last worked for actor Vishwajeet Pradhan in his residence at Anmol complex in Goregaon west. Within three days of her appointment, she fled with Rs63,000 in cash from the cupboard in the actor’s residence.
A week earlier, Verma worked for Leena Lakhani in Mahindra Gardens at Goregaon west. While Lakhani and her husband were away, Verma spilled water in the bedroom where Lakahnis mother-in-law was taking rest. Verma asked the elderly woman to go out of the room while she was cleaning up the floor. She then broke open the safe and decamped with cash and jewelry worth Rs4 lakhs.
Verma has four similar cases lodged in the MHB police station. “We spread the information among our secret informers and also distributed her sketch. We learnt that she had gone to Vaishnodevi where she went regularly. We laid a trap and arrested her from Naigaon as soon as she returned to the city,” said deputy commissioner of police Sanjay Banerjee.
Verma hails from Jaunpur in Uttar Pradesh. While she robbed, her husband, who is still at large, sold the stolen gold to jewellers across the city.
Police said that Verma is misleading them about the names of the jewellers to whom the gold was sold. The police are yet to recover the stolen booty.
“It’s very worrisome that the people are still employing servants without knowing their background and registering their details with the police,” added Banerjee.
–Agencies–