A fight between two pimps over prostitution money ended in the murder of one them. The police got a whiff of the murder and arrested the accused with the help of an ambulance driver three days after the murder. When the Versova police called an ambulance at Siddharth Nagar on Saturday for ferrying the unidentified body of a woman wrapped in a gunny bag, little did they know they would soon reach the perpetrator through it.
The ambulance driver helped the police in cracking the case by telling them about a call he received a day before. The caller claimed that his wife was dead and wanted the ambulance to transport it to a cemetery. But when the driver asked him if he had completed the hospital and police procedures, he hung up abruptly.
“On learning about the call to the ambulance service, we immediately traced the number and cracked the case,” said police officer at Versova police station. The police have arrested the accused Krishanshu Sharma (43), a model coordinator who also runs a prostitution racket, for allegedly killing Sunita Singh (35) after a fight.
According to the Versova police, Sharma, who stays at Neptune Tower in Amboli, knew Singh for the past 10 years. Singh, a resident of Mohit Tower, was involved in running a prostitution racket. A few months ago, Singh learnt that she had AIDS and asked Sharma to take care of her 14-year-old daughter Preeti (name changed) and get her a few modelling assignments.
However, on February 22, Singh found out that Sharma had been using Preeti for prostitution. Irked, she called him to her house and asked him to give her the share of money her daughter had earned, and to return her daughter so she could earn through her. When Sharma refused, Singh verbally abused him and the two began bickering.
Sharma took out a knife from his pocket and stabbed Singh to death. On February 24, when he was wrapping her body to dump it, Preeti saw him. Sharma told her that she had died of AIDS and asked her to keep an eye out for police vehicles from the window of Mohit Towers.
Officers said that after wrapping Singh’s body in a gunny bag, he asked his driver Ashish to get his Tata Safari. The three then dumped Singh’s body in the mangroves at Siddharth Nagar in Versova. On Saturday, when cops discovered the body, they called up Cooper Hospital, asking for an ambulance to take the body for postmortem. The driver of the ambulance dispelled the mystery and told the police that he had received a call on Feb 24 about disposing of a woman’s body.
“The driver said that when he asked the caller if he had police’s permission, the latter disconnected the phone,” said Nandkumar Mhetar, senior police inspector of Versova police station. The police then traced the call and detained Sharma. After interrogating him, Sharma confessed to the crime and said that Singh wanted a share of her daughter’s work. The police have arrested Sharma for murder and also Preeti and Ashish for conspiracy.