Patna's 'serial killer' targets only women

By the account of the Patna police as well as his own, Mukesh Thakur, 22, is a serial killer, one who targeted only women, apparently because it was a woman who had once turned him in for burglary.

Thakur is said to have attacked 10 women between September 2012 and February 2013, killing seven of them. He allegedly carried out eight of those attacks alone, while three accomplices, his old-time cronies in theft and robbery, were allegedly with him during the other two attacks.

Each woman had her head smashed in with a brick, a stone or a similar blunt object. In one of the attacks, the woman's husband too was killed, the only male victim along the murder trail.

Though the killer or killers did snatch the jewellery the women wore, that did not seem to have been the primary motive. Patna police had been puzzled by the trend until they arrested Thakur on Sunday evening. Senior SP Amrit Raj said Thakur, "who seems a psychopath", has confessed to the murders, described each one in detail, and is unrepentant.

Thakur belongs to Chipura village in Gaurichak, on the outskirts of Patna. His parents and his wife threw him out a year ago, fed up with frequent visits by police teams looking for him in connection with theft and burglary cases. He had been arrested in such a case once; the murders that he has been accused of were committed after his release. On Sunday, Thakur was arrested from Gobarchak in Phulwarisharif, where he was staying on rent.

"Thakur is a big catch because police were confused about the murders of and attacks on women in Phulwarisharif, Danapur and Jakkanpur," said SSP Raj. The police also arrested Vikki Kumar alias Gore, Mohammed Raja and Suraj Kumar, all residents of Janipur village in rural Patna, and who allegedly went with Thakur on two of the 10 occasions.

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