Suspected killer of nun held by Uttarakhand police

Kottayam: A man suspected to be the killer of an elderly nun at Pala in the district has been arrested by Uttarakhand police.

A team of police officials from Kerala today left for Haridwar after it received information that Uttarakhand police have arrested one Satheesh Babu, against whom a lookout notice was issued Wednesday by the state police for allegedly killing 69-year-old sister Amala in her Lisieux Carmel Convent in Pala on September 17, police said.

Satheesh Babu, a native of Kasargod, is stated to have been arrested from a guest house of an Ashram in Haridwar by Uttarakhand police after Kerala police gave a specific input about his presence there, they said.

Kerala police who had put mobile phones of Satheesh's relatives and friends under surveillance came to know from a message received by his elder brother from Haridwar that the murder accused was camping at the guest house of an Ashram.

Kerala police immediately passed information regarding Satheesh Babu's crime to Uttarakhand police and he was held from the Ashram guest house, police said.

A four-member police team led by Pala Deputy SP C S Suneesh Babu has left for Haridwar to take custody of the suspected killer, police said.

Claiming a breakthrough in the sensational murder of the nun, police had said yesterday that they have identified one Satheesh Babu from Kasargod, a habitual drunkard, as the assassin.

His photographs were also released to media by police.

Police, which conducted the probe with the help of its cyber cell, suspect that Satheesh Babu is a serial offender targeting convents.

Sister Amala was found dead in a pool of blood in her convent room on September 17.

A deep injury with a sharp edged weapon on her back and minor wounds were found on her forehead, police had said.

Suspecting that it is a case of "unnatural death", police had immediately constituted a team of officials headed by Suneesh Babu to probe the case.