Man accused of killing 11 persons in the guise of treasure hunting held in Nagarkurnool

Hyderabad: The Nagarkurnool police have arrested a most wanted man who is said to have killed at least 11 persons. He would lure in his victims under the pretext of helping them find treasure and kill them. He has done this in various places across Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka since 2020.

The accused, Ramati Sathyanarayana, has been evading arrest ever since and this was the first time he was arrested. The police officials also seized cell phones belonging to him and the persons he had allegedly killed, boxes of bottles containing poisonous substances and electrical detonators among other things.

According to police records, Sathyanarayana is wanted for murders by police stations in Wanaparthy, Nagarkurnool, Kalwakurthy, Balaganoor, Kollapur and Peddavadugur (Ananthapur).

Modus Operandi

According to the police, Sathyanarayana would first make his victims believe that he knows locations where treasure is buried by performing puja. In exchange for the information, he would make the victims pay him money or transfer lands to his name.

Once the exchange was done, Sathyanarayana would take his victims to some isolated and desolate place where he would kill them by pouring acid or some poisonous substance into their mouths. As soon as they became partially unconscious, he would kill them by throwing boulders on their head.

The police said that Sathyanarayana had done this to 11 persons, including one woman. So far, there is confirmation that he is an accused in eight of the 11 murder cases.

The case that led to the accused

The case that led the police to Sathyanarayana was the missing case of Govuala Venkatesh, who used to stay in Langar Houz, Hyderabad.

Govula Laxmi, wife of Venkatesh, filed a complaint to the police that Venkatesh went to meet Sathyanarayana in Nagarkurnool five days ago and has been missing ever since. She said that their family contacted Sathyanarayana who said he didn’t know about Venkatesh's whereabouts. Soon, the police got involved and they found Sathyanarayana’s behaviour suspicious which led to further investigation.

The case details

The accused has been residing in Nagarkurnool town for the last several years and he was in the real estate business. He also practised treating people with herbal medicine (naatu vaidyam) and was also in the habit of treasure hunts with the help of herbs.

When Venkatesh and his friends came to know about him, they approached him for hidden treasure at Kollapur and the accused agreed to do it for money.

To ‘find the treasure,’ Sathyanarayana asked Venkatesh to put some herbs in a place that Venkatesh believed held hidden treasure. Later, Sathyanarayana told Venkatesh that human slaughter was needed to find the treasure to which Venkatesh objected and asked Sathyanarayana to return the money.

Then, pretending that there is another way to get the treasure, Sathyanarayana called Venkatesh to Nagarkurnool on November 3, 2023. When they met at an isolated place, Sathyanarayana did some make-believe puja and asked Venkatesh to consume the theertham (holy water), to which he had added the poisonous extract of Calotropis plant (jiledu palu).

When Venkatesh fell unconscious after drinking it, Sathyanarayana took him to the outskirts of Jalalpur village where he killed Venkatesh by pouring acid on him and hid his shirt and purse. He then returned to Nagarkurnool.

The entire incident was revealed through investigation of the Nagarkurnool police which led to his arrest on December 12. The accused was handed over to CIP Nagarkurnool PS for further investigation where Sathyanarayana confessed to similarly killing more than 10 people.

The police appealed to the public to be aware of people who deceive in the guise of treasure hunts.