The Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) probing the Panampilly Nagar beauty parlour firing case on Saturday collected the voice samples of gangster Ravi Pujari, the third accused in the case, further corroborating his role in the incident.
The voice samples will now be scientifically compared with the alleged voice clips of the gangster that the investigation team has collected from a news channel. Shortly after the firing outside the beauty parlour owned by actor Leena Maria Paul on December 15, 2018, the channel had received a call from a man claiming to be the gangster owning up the incident.
The investigation team is looking for a scientific match of the voice clips, which will corroborate the charges against him though he is already learnt to have admitted it during the ongoing grilling.
The gangster reportedly targeted Ms. Paul after he was alerted about her alleged involvement in financial misappropriation cases that probably made her a fit target for extortion. He allegedly contracted gangs in south India for the extortion bid, and the latter are suspected to have assigned the job to some local criminal elements here.
The eventual firing turned out to be a somewhat botched-up job, as it emerged that the youngsters engaged, who were eventually arrested, had no previous experience in using firearms and had to be trained before pulling off the stunt.
At least two more accused involved in the case are absconding, while the gangster is being grilled to find whether more people were possibly associated with the incident.
The ATS team is also looking into criminal acts in the State other than the firing case with which the gangster possibly has links. He had allegedly rung up and threatened politicians, including Kerala Congress leader P.C. George, in the past.
The firing case initially probed by the Crime Branch was handed over to the ATS in August, 2020. The Crime Branch team had made three arrests in the case and recovered the firearm used for the crime.
The ATS has been given custody of the gangster till June 8.
