A 39-year-old Bengaluru-based woman Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of an Artificial Intelligence (AI) start-up, Suchana Seth, has been arrested for the murder of her four-year-old son at a luxury hotel in Goa.
Seth was detained by the Chitradurga Police after the cab driver whom she hired in Goa to head towards Bengaluru drove into the Aimangala Police Station in Hiriyur taluk on Monday afternoon after being instructed by the Goa Police.
Seth had packed her son’s body in a suitcase kept in the boot of the car.
Goa Police have now arrested and moved her to Goa for investigation, even as the body is at the Government Hospital in Hiriyur.
Seth has reportedly sustained an injury on her wrist, and amid reports that she attempted to end her life as well, Goa Police said that the investigation is in its early stages to confirm that.
Superintendent of Police, North Goa, Nidhin Valsan, said that while it is too early to pin down the motive for the crime, Seth has been upset with the ongoing divorce proceedings with her husband Venkat Raman, also an AI developer from Kerala, now based in Indonesia.
“According to her, divorce proceedings in court have ended and she is unhappy with the court order,” he quoted her as saying.
How the case unfolded
Suchana Seth, hailing from West Bengal, has been in Bengaluru since 2008 and is now the CEO of Mindful AI Lab, a start-up that was launched in 2020, specialising in AI ethics advisory and audits. She had taken a villa at Sol Banyan Grande Hotel in Candolim in North Goa on Sunday with her son and checked out on Monday, asking for a cab to Bengaluru.
Sources said that even though the hotel staff said that a flight was more convenient and cheaper, she insisted on a cab. The hotel staff reportedly informed the police after they found blood stains in the villa she had rented out.
Calangute Police Inspector Paresh Naik called the cab driver and spoke to the woman inquiring about her missing son, to which she said she had left him with a friend in Margao, whose address turned out to be false.
Alarmed by this, Mr. Naik again called the cab driver and directed him to drive into the nearest police station while being on call with him, but without alerting the woman passenger.
As the cab drove into Aimangala Police Station at 1.30 p.m. on Monday, the cab driver handed over the call to the policemen at the station, who was briefed by Mr. Naik from Goa.
“The lady looked surprised. However, she did not resist,” said one of the officers present at the police station when the incident happened.
To their shock, police discovered the body of the four-year-old boy child in a suitcase.
Sources in the Chitradurga Police said that the boy did not have any visible external injuries on the body, except for some bleeding in his nose.
The police said that the boy was probably suffocated to death with a pillow. The autopsy will be conducted at the Government Hospital in Hiriyur.
“She was clearly disturbed, and she hardly spoke to us. She remained silent and did not respond to any of our questions. But she had an injury on her wrist and seemed to have attempted to take her life as well,” the officer at Aimangala Police Station said.
