Camera-fitted handbag used by suspects

A handbag kitted out with a miniature spy camera was used to slyly record the encounters between the women suspects and their male victims in what has come to be known as the Kochi sex-blackmail case.

July 30, 2014 01:13 pm | Updated 01:13 pm IST - Thiruvananthapuram:

A handbag kitted out with a miniature spy camera was used to slyly record the encounters between the women suspects and their male victims in what has come to be known as the Kochi sex-blackmail case.

Investigators here said the women had purchased the ‘button spy camera’ from an online store around the same time they solicited the complainants in the case, both moneyed businessmen. The plot to trap and blackmail the men seemed to be well planned and straight out of a cold war era spy craft manual, they said.

The police case was that the accused demanded Rs.3 crore from the complainants for not making video recordings public, initially through a local journalist who acted as a middleman. The police later found the blackmail material, video recordings, stored in a pen drive they seized from the suspects. The extortion case assumed sudden political significance last week after a television channel ‘disclosed’ that one of the alleged conspirators in the crime, Jayachandran, had stayed at the MLA Hostel here at the behest of former legislator and Congress leader Sarathchandra Prasad. The politician has since denied any link with the accused. However, the police said they would record his statement.

The Youth Congress expelled one of its members whose car was confiscated from Jayachandran at the time of his arrest. Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala has ordered Additional Director General of Police (ADGP), South Zone, K. Padmakumar to investigate the case.

Police to seek custody

Staff Reporter writes from Kochi: The city police will seek the custody of Jayachandran. “We will decide on whether to question political party members or any others after getting custody of Jayachandran and questioning him,” said Deputy Commissioner of Police R. Nishanthini.

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