Hyderabad: K Rakesh Reddy, the prime suspect in the sensational murder of NRI businessman Chigurupati Jayaram was convicted and sentenced to undergo life imprisonment by a local court on Thursday. The court also imposed a fine of Rs. 10,000 on him.
Jayaram, a pharma scientist and NRI businessman from the United States was found dead in his car on the national highway at Nandigama of Krishna district in Andhra Pradesh on January 31, 2019. The police initially assumed it was a case of road accident.
However, later during the investigation the police suspected that it was a murder and attempts were made by the killer to pass it off as a road accident. The police later found some messages while analyzing the call details record of the mobile phone maintained by Jayaram. The text messages also tallied with the messages found in his mobile phone chat box.
“Jayaram was honey-trapped by Rakesh Reddy. He was called to a house and confined in a house and forced to pay money by Rakesh Reddy. He was also made to sign blank papers. Rakesh Reddy then smothered the victim to death and took the body in a car to Nandigama in A.P and later kept the body in a car and tried to pass it off as a road accident,” said the then ACP Banjara Hills, ACP K Srinivasa Rao.
The police had cited 11 other persons including three police officers as accused in the case. However, all the 11 persons were acquitted by the court.