Kerala Police exhume one of the bodies in Kattappana double murder

The police had earlier found the hammer which was used to murder Vijayan.

The police are said to have initiated the process to exhume the body of the neonate, which is said to have been buried in another location.

The cops stumbled upon the murders while investigating a routine case of theft in a local store in which they had arrested Nitheesh (31) and Vishnu Vijayan (27) on 2 March.

As part of the investigation, police went to Vishnu’s house, where they came across details about the murders of his father Vijayan and his newborn nephew, officials said.

Also Read: How a case of theft led Kerala police to suspected twin murder

How the police found the murders

The police said that they realised things were not adding up as the family members revealed that Vijayan had been missing for the last few months.

According to the FIR registered on Saturday by the cops, Nitheesh allegedly bludgeoned Vijayan to death due to a past enmity. Later, Vishnu and his mother Suma allegedly helped him bury Vijayan’s body in a room inside the house.

“We suspect that this happened in August 2023,” the police told PTI.

The police also discovered that a child was born to Vishnu’s sister and Nitheesh. In 2016, Vishnu, Vijayan and Nitheesh had allegedly murdered the baby and buried the body in a cattle shed of another rented house.

The police have now registered an FIR in this case as well. Evidence has been collected to probe both cases, they said.

Niteesh, a priest, became close to the family of Vijayan, promising that he would cure an ailment of Vijayan’s daughter. According to the FIR, the newborn baby was murdered since Niteesh and Vijayan’s daughter were unmarried.

Vishnu is currently under treatment after suffering an injury during the theft attempt and is in judicial custody.

Earlier, the police had suspected that the murders were done as part of some black magic rituals.

(With PTI inputs)