Four persons, including a 29-year-old man, had been arrested on charges of robbery, cheating and theft of gold ornaments and a four-wheeler here on Tuesday.
In the first case, Kottai Raja (29), son of Gurusami, who was driving a car bearing registration number TN 63 M 9966 was stopped at a check-post during random check of the registration certificate and other documents. A check with the Transport Department’s data revealed the registration number to be that of a two-wheeler owned by a woman residing at Ilayankudi in Sivaganga district.
Investigation revealed that Kottai Raja belonged to a family of police personnel — his brother, sister and brother-in-law are working in the police department. The four-wheeler driven by him belonged to a doctor, Senthil Kumar, working in a private medical college in Chennai. According to Inspector of Police (Crime) Netaji, the man worked for the doctor and left the job over a misunderstanding with the latter. He stole the vehicle in mid-2011 and had been using it with the fake registration number.
Further, in a bid to evade arrest and confiscation of the vehicle, he used to sport flags of political parties such as the AIADMK, DMK, Thevar Peravai and Pattali Makkal Katchi in front of the vehicle. Depending on the place and circumstance, he displayed the flag and travelled from one place to another across the southern districts.
In the second case, Vasudevan, son of Rathinam Chettiar, had lodged a complaint with the Vilakkuthoon police last month that gold coins weighing around 60 sovereigns and jewels, including silver ornaments, valued at Rs. 21 lakh were stolen from his house. From the inputs and leads gathered from various sources, the police teams secured Alagarsami (25), son of Radhakrishnan, and Saravanakumar, (21), son of Ramanathan, both from Thathaneri in Madurai. The two first-time offenders confessed to the crime and the jewels were recovered from them, said Deputy Commissioner of Police (Crime) Feroze Khan Abdullah at a press conference here on Tuesday.
In the next case, the police arrested R. Arunkumar, working as a commission agent in buying and selling gold ornaments. According to a jeweller, P. Saravanan, who runs his business at Ayodhi Raman Complex near Meenakshi Sundareswarar Temple, Arunkumar took three gold chains for selling, but did not give either the cash or the jewels even after a month.
In the fourth case, a four-sovereign gold chain of an old woman, Rukmani of South Marret Street, was stolen by one Kumar (35) of Vilangudi. He was arrested by a special team of police and the chain was recovered.