Body parts human, blood traces found in flat: Police
Bones found in a forest in Chhattarpur, where the remains of Shraddha Walkar were allegedly dumped, appear to be of a human body, and traces of blood have been lifted from the flat where the 27-yearold woman lived with her partner, Aaftab Amin Poonawala, the prime suspect in the investigation, police officers aware of the case that has stunned the Capital said on Tuesday.
These samples will now be sent for forensics analysis, and could provide the first prosecutable evidence against Poonawala, who, police say, has confessed to the crime under questioning. The police confession, however, is not admissible in law, and circumstantial evidence may be inadequate to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt.
Investigators retrieved 13 bone pieces till Monday from spots behind the Chhattarpur Pahadi crematorium where Poonawala allegedly said he dumped parts of Walkar’s body. “No missing body parts were recovered on Tuesday. The weapon (used to dismember the body) has also not been recovered. One of our doctors, however, confirmed that the 13 decomposed bones are indeed human remains. We will send it to the forensic science laboratory (FSL),” a police officer said, asking not to be named.
An FSL officer, also privy to the investigation, said forensic teams that scoured the alleged crime scene — the couple’s Chhattarpur flat — spotted some traces of bloodstains in the kitchen. Samples were lifted and will be taken for examination later. “The refrigerator was totally clean when our officials went to the flat to lift samples. No evidence could be collected from the refrigerator. From the decomposed bones, we will try to match the DNA samples and match it with the woman’s father. But this process will take at least a week,” this person added, asking not to be named.
The police officer cited above added that, according to the doctor, the bones appeared to be of ribs and the pelvic region, and the blood samples were lifted from wooden cabinets around the kitchen sink and the marble platform. These were collected four days ago, but the FSL officer cited above said that the lab was yet to receive them for testing. The reason for the delay was not clear.
NEW DELHI: The extraction of DNA samples from the body parts allegedly disposed of in a drain by the suspect in the Shraddha Walkar case may prove to be tricky since the human remains may have been contaminated by the sludge and toxic elements in the drain water, said experts from the Delhi Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL).
The Delhi Police have recovered at least 13 pieces of bones at the instance of Aaftab Amin Poonawala who allegedly murdered and chopped Walkar’s body and disposed of the parts at several locations in south Delhi.
FSL officials said that the police were yet to hand over the samples to them. The officials added that after the recovered samples are shared with the laboratory, they will be cleaned and the procedure to isolate the bone marrow and extraction of DNA samples will begin. Explaining the process of DNA profiling, FSL assistant director Sanjeev Kumar Gupta said that the analysis is done in four stages, beginning with the extraction of DNA from the collected samples such as bones, blood, hair, nails, etc. “DNA is found inside the nucleus of a cell. So, it is extracted with the help of phenol chloroform method and preserved in a buffer. The second stage is DNA quantification that is done to check the quality and quantity of the DNA. The third stage is called PCR amplification. As the DNA is in small quantities from forensic samples, it is amplified by polymerase chain reaction(PCR) and billions of copies are produced. The final stage is DNA sequencing wherein DNA sequences are produced in the form of peaks in a graph and matched with the standard samples,” Gupta said.
On Saturday around 11 am, a two-member FSL team visited the forested area where personnel from the Mehrauli police station were present along with Poonawala. The policemen told the forensic experts that some bones were seen in a drain. The forensic experts collected the pieces of bones, stored in boxes and handed over to the police.
They also visited the flat, where Poonawala allegedly confessed to have strangled Walkar, chopped her body into at least 35 pieces.
Poonawala accompanied the police and forensic personnel to the flat and showed the bedroom where he allegedly strangled Walkar, and the bathroom where he chopped her body. He told the personnel that he had cleaned the flat several times using “hypochlorous acid” and other toilet and floor cleaning solutions. “We carried out the benzidine test in the flat and the fridge to find traces of blood. While the bathroom and the refrigerator were found clean, some traces of blood were found on the platform and wooden cabinets of the kitchen sink. We will analyse the sample to ascertain if they belong to Walkar or Poonawala,” said another forensic expert.
Retired Delhi police officer Maxwell Pereira said that forensic experts have the ability to extract DNA samples from “even 100 years old remains”. “If the recovered parts are indeed of the same woman, then it can be easily analysed,” said Pereira who supervised the probe in the 1995 Delhi Tandoor murder case.