Kerala model gang-raped in Kochi, one arrested: Police
A senior police officer of the port city said the accused were suspected to be part of a well-knit racket that produced porn and sold them to various adult sites.
Kerala police on Monday arrested a man and is on the lookout for three others, including a woman, in connection with a gang-rape case of a 25-year-old model in Kochi.
A senior police officer of the port city said the accused were suspected to be part of a well-knit racket that produced porn and sold them to various adult sites.
The arrested has been identified as Salim Kumar and has been booked under rape (section 375), wrongful confinement (section 340) and other sections. The woman was booked under charges abetment to crime and conspiracy, the police said.
According to police, the model, hailing from Malappuram, was summoned by the three men on the pretext of a three-day photo shoot at a lodge owned by the accused woman in Kochi on November 28. After the second day of the shoot, the accused gang-raped her for the next two days after she denied shooting “objectionable” images and videos for the perpetrators, the police said. The accused blackmailed her that they would release explicit images, and she was let go on the promise that she would not file a police complaint, the police added.
“We fear many girls might be trapped and blackmailed like this. we have recovered some videos from the lodge where she was assaulted. Since the probe is at initial stage we can’t disclose more about it,” said a senior police officer who did not want to identify himself. he also said the woman’s charges of “inept handling” will also be investigated. In her compliant she alleged that she was asked too many embarrassing questions at the Info Park police station by the station in-charge.
The victim told police that the accused probably cheated many girls, especially from other states, who might have kept silent, fearing the leak of videos containing intimate scenes.
The victim has alleged that the police failed to act initially, which helped some of the accused abscond. The police have denied any laxity on their part.
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