The district police have arrested two persons, including a postgraduate mechanical engineer, who were part of the dacoit gang recently arrested by Ramanathapuram police, and recovered 137 sovereigns of gold chains, valued at about Rs 25 lakh, from them.
Giving details of the arrest of S. Keeri alias Karthik alias Sundarapandian (26), an engineer, and P. Manikandan (32), Superintendent of Police Ashwin M. Kotnis told reporters here on Friday that a special team arrested the accused during a vehicle check at Sengani Amman Koil area in Karaikudi on Friday morning.
Acting under the supervision of Karaikudi Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Murugesh, a special team led by Kundrakudi Inspector of Police Ravindran, and Inspector of Police (Crime, Karaikudi) Sakthivel arrested the duo on suspicion and later found they were members of the dacoit gang and involved in several chain snatching cases, the SP said.
He said interrogation revealed that the accused had initially operated with the dacoit gang, headed by J. Saravanan of Ramanathapuram and committed dacoities and house break-ins last year before leaving the gang and started snatching chains Karaikudi, Kalayarkoil and Devakottai areas.
They were involved in 29 criminal activities in Sivaganga, Madurai and Virudhunagar districts, the SP said. The duo ganging up with Saravanan, Udayakumar and Palpandi of Madurai also made a vain bid to loot a cooperative bank in Tiruvannamalai after breaking open the shutter, using gas welder, the SP said.
They had pledged the snatched chains with a pawn broker and the police recovered the gold chains from the pawn broker, the SP added.
Ramanathapuram district police recently arrested Saravanan, Udayakumar and Palpandi, who were remanded in judicial custody.
