Crushed petals

Police probe the deaths of two schoolchildren:

Last week the whole nation grieved when they heard about the gruesome murder of an 11 year old schoolboy who was whisked away from school and stabbed to death by a man who lived in the same paddyfield house. His body camouflaged in leaves was found in a muddy paddyfiled in a lonely spot at Polbadinawa Anguruwatota.

One week later we again heard the death of another girl student from Passara Maha Vidyalaya who was raped and assaulted with a blunt weapon. Her body was found dumped on a lonely stretch of an estate at Lunugala by her mother. These days the murder of innocent children seems to be on the increase with assassins showing no sympathy towards children as in Western countries.

As far as Buddika Chaturange Guruge's murder was concerned, it was a pre-planned, calculated affair. The eleven year old schoolboy was stabbed twice on his neck with a knife. While the boy was grasping for breath the assassin held the boys neck in the mud so that he would suffocate and die.

Only an insane person could have done such a thing said the Anguruwathota police. History is filled with such harrowing stories where innocent children had become victims of sadistic murderers. The victim was a 5th grade student at Dobagoda Seelaratne Vidyalaya in the Anguruwatota police area.

According to OIC Anguruwatota police station, Chief Inspector H.A Guneratne, the assassin was a middle aged man (47) who was employed as a security guard at a private hospital in Colombo. He was assigned car park duties at the hospital.

The suspect security officer had lived with his wife and four children in a room in Buddika's house. It was Buddika's mother who had invited the suspect and his family to share a room in their home when the family visited them three months ago. This was because Buddika's father was abroad and she was alone in the house with her three small children. Buddika was the second child in her family. He had an elder sister and a younger brother.

However by a strange twist of fate, the mothers kind gesture had brought misery to her life. The security officer was a cranky and combative character. He never looked straight into a persons eyes while talking says an inmate of the house.

Buddika's mother never dreamt that a person living in the same household would commit such a dastardly act. But it soon became apparent to her that the assassin had committed the murder to extract money from her.

The trouble began when the security officer's wife kept nagging him to find a house elsewhere. The suspect wanted to purchase a house at Keselhenawa for a sum of Rs 1.4 million. But he had no cash with him and was desperate to find it somehow or the other.

One day he mapped out an eerie plan to accompany Buddika to a lonely spot and stab him to death.

According to OIC Anguruwatota, Police Station, Chief Inspector Guneratna, the suspect had confessed to the police of killing Buddika. His motive was to hide the boy's body somewhere and demand money from his mother to locate him. But the plan misfired when a school boy had seen Buddika leaving Seelaratne Vidyalaya at Dobagoda Horana on the push bicycle of the suspect.

The incident had happened around 7.30. am on 14th August. When Buddika's school friend asked him where he was heading he had not replied. On that fateful day Buddika had left home around 7.am to school to follow a scholarship class.

He was a bright student who had immense hope of winning a scholarship to attend a better school to further his education. But fate decreed otherwise. As the boy did not attend school a teacher had noticed his absence and informed the School principal who in turn had informed the boys mother. The mother later lodged a complaint at Anguruwatota police. The suspect is now in remand custody till investigations are over.

The second murder of a school girl was reported to Lunegala Police station. OIC Lunugala Police station Inspector Channa Abeysinghe told the Sunday Observer that the deceased girl R.M.K. Manohari (20) was a school prefect of the Passara Maha Vidyalaya in the Advanced Level class.

She was raped and beaten on her head with a blunt weapon by an unknown person. Her body was found in a forest reservation at Maduwatte in the Hopton estate Lunugala by her mother.

According to the OIC Lunugala Police station, she came from a poor family and travelled 9 miles every day to school. As the girl did not return home that evening they searched the route she took that day and found her body in a shrub. According to Police a stranger would have committed the gruesome crime.

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