A 23-year-old man allegedly raped a mentally challenged woman, slashed her face and head with a sharp object before bludgeoning her to death using a stone here, the Delhi Police said on Friday as they called the accused a 'psycho killer'.
The accused, Salman alias Bona, was arrested from Gujarat following an intensive manhunt.
The Delhi Police tracked down with the help of CCTV footage and a pair of slippers he had left at the crime spot, an officer said.
He added that the accused raped the 52-year-old woman before brutally murdering her.
On November 16, police received information that a woman's body was lying in some shrubs behind Adarsh Nagar Railway Station.
The deceased, later identified as Seejan, was a rag picker and resident of Metro Vihar in Holambi Kalan, he said.
According to the police, the semi-naked body bore deep cut wounds on the face and head, apparently inflicted with a knife.
A weapon of offence, a pair of women's slippers and another belonging to a man were recovered from the spot.
Following this, an investigation into the matter was launched after registering a case.
"CCTV footage from a public toilet near the station showed the woman entering the premises. Moments later, a man dressed in a pink shirt, grey pants and white-and-black slippers was seen following her. The slippers matched the ones recovered from the scene," the officer said.
The footage also showed the suspect exiting barefoot towards Sarai Peepal Thala, he said.
The CCTV trail led investigators to the Jhuggis of Badhola village, where the suspect was identified as Salman.
However, he had fled before police reached his residence, the officer added.
Teams were dispatched to Loni in Ghaziabad, Mukundpur and Kasganj in Uttar Pradesh, but the accused remained untraceable. His mobile phone had been switched off since the day before the murder.
On the intervening night of November 17 and 18, a tip-off was received that Salman had fled to Vedach in Gujarat. The accused was subsequently arrested and during interrogation, he confessed to the murder, the officer said.
"The accused was following the victim and he first hit a stone on her head injuring her badly. He then raped her and before leaving the spot, he murdered her using a sharp-edge weapon. The nature of the crime was gruesome. We are investigating the entire matter further," the officer said.
The police said that Salman is a habitual offender, who is previously involved in two heinous cases of robbery and kidnapping and rape of a minor girl.
We are under the process to understand that why he killed the mentally challenged woman, the officer said.