A 65-year-old Catholic priest was found murdered in the early hours of Monday at the St. Peter’s Pontifical Seminary in Malleswaram, where he was serving as rector.
The body of rector K.J. Thomas was found with multiple head injuries in a coffee room on the seminary premises, the police said.
A senior police official said that he had been hit on the head with a blunt object. The incident came to light around 6.15 a.m. when the procurator, Father Patrick, who also lives on the premises, alerted the Yeshwantpur police after he found the body.
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Father Patrick told the police that he heard a noise around 2.30 a.m., after it had rained in the area. Incidentally, the murder took place when all students of the seminary — nearly 200 of them — were away on vacation, the police said.
Ransacked
They added that the murder could have taken place between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m. Though the premises was found ransacked, the police did not find any valuables missing. The motive for the murder is yet to be ascertained.
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Police Commissioner B.G. Jyothi Prakash Mirji, who, along with senior police officials, visited the spot on Monday morning, said that they were awaiting the post-mortem report from M.S. Ramaiah Hospital where the body was sent for an autopsy.