Sr executive turns out to be murder convict who escaped jail in 2013, held

A 36-year-old senior executive of a private firm here was arrested on Thursday by the Uttar Pradesh Police after he turned out to be a kidnapping-and-murder accused who had escaped jail six years ago, officials said.

Accused Jitendra, alias Cheeku, who was staying in Delhi's New Ashok Nagar and working at a private firm in Sector 60, was arrested around 4 pm from his office by the Noida unit of the Special Task Force of UP Police, they said.

"Jitendra was lodged in Agra jail where he was serving a life term. In 2001, he along with an accomplice had kidnapped an eight-year-old child for ransom in Ghaziabad. They had demanded a ransom of Rs 30 lakh but later killed the child and dumped his body in a canal in Muradnagar," Deputy Superintendent of Police, STF, Raj Kumar Mishra said.

"He and his accomplice Neeraj were subsequently arrested and sentenced to life term in 2007 by a court in Ghaziabad. They were lodged in the Agra central jail from where he managed to abscond on November 15, 2013," he said.

The matter was eventually handed over to the UP STF and a reward of Rs 50,000 announced on his arrest. During the probe, his presence was ascertained in Delhi-NCR, the officials said.

"Working on credible information that he now works for a private firm in Noida as its senior executive, the STF today reached his office and held him," the DSP said.

The accused is being handed over to the Agra Police, with whom a case was lodged after he fled jail, and further proceedings would be done by the local police, he said.

"Jitendra was a sharp student and had cracked the preliminary and mains examination of IIT but committed the crime before joining IIT for B.Tech," Mishra added.