Fifty gundu (locally-made high-impact crackers), eight litres of petrol, a basic remote, a simple circuit and YouTube tutorial were all that required for the accused to assemble crude Improvised Explosives Devices (IEDs) to trigger twin blasts at a crowded Jehovah’s Witnesses prayer convention at Kalamassery that sent shock waves beyond the borders of the State on Sunday.
Interrogation of the lone accused Martin V.D,. a resident of Thammanam, left the special investigation team probing the blast case almost in sheer disbelief by the simplicity and ingenuity with which he created mayhem that left three dead and scores with burn injuries.
What was even more intriguing was how he almost spared the police the hard work of collecting evidence as he produced almost the entire ambit of self-incriminating evidence, including video shot using his mobile of triggering the blast using the remote.
Open and shut case
According to senior police sources, it was a case of open and shut case that could be wrapped up in full in a matter of days as he left no room for suspicion about his role in the heinous drama.
Though the police had looked for potential accomplices, they have not found any yet.
“He had packed 2 big shopper bags with 25 gundu and four litres of petrol each wired into a simple circuit that could be detonated using the remote. He had procured the gundu, petrol and a remote locally and even had bills for them. The remote triggered the gundu to blast and the presence of petrol turned the entire thing into a huge fireball,” said senior police sources.
The accused had assembled the IEDs at a building he owned and rented out in Athani within Chengamanad police station limits in Ernakulam rural. Reportedly, he had left his rented home at Thammanam around 5 a.m., collected the bag containing IEDs and went to the convention centre where he planted them ahead of the start of the convention.
Bid to alert wife
Incidentally, Martin’s mother-in-law was also present at the congregation that he targeted. Though he had tried to ring up his wife in an attempt to stop his mother-in-law from attending the prayer convention, the call went unattended.
“The accused seemed to have a skewed mental state as his thought process was not plausible. He continued to confess to his crime and wanted to be convicted by the court to publicise the purpose of his action. However, he had no answer when questioned what he achieved by killing people,” said sources who also ruled out the possibility of the accused having conducted any trial before the actual blast. It was a simple design that needed little technical expertise, they said.
