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| Misplaced
trust that led to a killing Slain Inspector Thabrew first met Madan near the Dehiwala Zoological Gardens a few months back. Madan who was from the Wanni had told Inspector Thabrew that he had left the Wanni and came to Colombo because he was dissatisfied with the way the LTTE operated. Madan had told the Inspector that he was in a position to reveal top secrets regarding the LTTE and that he was prepared to act as a police informant. Mr. Thabrew had agreed with Madan's suggestion and recruited him as one of his informants and also got Madan a job in a fish-exporting firm. Madan regularly came to the Dehiwala police station to meet Mr. Thabrew and even spent hours in his company discussing various matters connected to the LTTE. Madan even supplied some information about the LTTE to the Inspector's superiors. In another incident Inspector Thabrew had even intervened with the Wattala police in having Madan released when they had arrested him for behaving suspiciously on the route the Pakistani President Pervez Musharaf was to take on his way to Colombo from the Katunayake International Airport. "'But Madan act was one of treachery to his boss when he shot dead Sunil Thabrew who was sleeping in the police quarters after completing the night duty thereby proving the saying- a tiger never changes its spots", a colleague of the officer said. Madan allegedly killed IP Thabrew at about 10.00 in the morning of June 23 by shooting him twice on the head and escaped from the police quarters using the gate that leads out of the quarters. In his escape bid Madan ran down Anagarika Dharmapala Mawatha a distance of about 75 metres and then having stopped a three-wheeler which was going towards the Dehiwala Zoo had got into the vehicle and directed the driver to go through Waidya road up towards the Galle road. The alleged killer had beaten the three-wheel driver and had even threatened him with the nine mm gun that was allegedly used to kill the Inspector Thabrew. Madan had later thrown the weapon into some shrubs on Waidya road. Meanwhile three police officers of the Dehiwala police who were alerted by a matron that a person was seen escaping in a three-wheeler towards the Zoological gardens had hurried in pursuit in another three-wheeler in the direction the matron had pointed out . However the police at that time had not known that Inspector Thabrew had been shot dead. The killer was arrested when the three-wheeler he was travelling in was stopped at the army checkpoint, opposite the Commercial Bank, Dehiwala. At the time of the arrest the alleged killer had tried to use the cyanide capsule he had with him, however the policemen and soldiers who surrounded Madan thwarted the attempt at suicide. After the arrest, the killer had pretended to be unconscious and he was thereafter admitted to the Kalubowila teaching hospital for treatment and later discharged into police custody when he was found to be unharmed. A soldier on duty at the checkpoint at the time of the incident said he spotted a three-wheeler coming from Dehiwala towards Colombo followed by two police motorcycles with their head lights on. He said he then thought something serious was taking place and therefore he ran towards the three-wheeler which slowed down immediately. "Just then, police arrived there and tried to get hold of a person who was attempting to swallow something and then I too went there and helped police to restrain the person", he said. On that fateful day Madan had visited the Dehiwala Police station at about 7.30 am and had talked to Mr. Thabrew for about half an hour and had gone away when the Inspector had apparently told him that he needed to sleep after being out on night duty. However the killer had returned to the police quarters once again at after about two hours and waited for Mr. Thabrew at the police station for sometime and had later gone to where the Inspector was sleeping. Though some policemen had noticed Madan going towards the police quarters, they did not harbour any suspicion as they had seen him in regular contact with the police officer. Police said that Madan, was a regular visitor at the police station and they were used to seeing him often in the company of the slain Inspector. They said that even three days before the killing Madan had come to the police quarters with three others. Madan who is from Wanni had been providing information to Mr. Thabrew for about seven to eight months but the police did not suspect that he had maitained links with the LTTE. While Madan was posing as a police informant it now appears that he was in fact a member of the LTTE pistol gang and was regularly in touch with Mr. Thuiyawan the Wanni LTTE Intelligence Unit Chief who had reportedly assigned Madan with task of killing personnel of the Government intelligence units. It is reported that Madan had been initially sent assigned by the LTTE to assassinate EPDP leader Douglas Devananda and police officers involved in terrorist investigations. Subsequently Madan had been instructed to kill Inspector Thabrew and had also asked him not to return to Wanni without having completing that task. Madan had been given pistol training in an LTTE camp in the Wanni jungle and while in Colombo had stayed in a lodge in the Kadirasen street, Kotahena he had said he was provided with money for his food and accommodation by the LTTE. At the time of his death Mr. Thabrew was 40 years old and his wife was expecting their first child. His wife Dilani Rashika de Zoysa (32) who was shocked by the sudden death of her husband cried saying that before her husband went for duty the day before he was killed, he had plucked flowers and gave her some and had offered the rest at the shrine. Mr. Thabrew had joined police as a reserve police constable and was later promoted to the post of Inspector because of his special skills in dealing with terrorist investigations. In his statement to Mount Lavinia police Madan had said that he was released from the Kalutara prisons after the signing of the peace agreement and on a visit to Vauniya had met LTTE leader Thuiyawan. Investigations have also revealed that the killer had photographed several members of the Intelligence Unit of the Dehiwala police station and had handed them over to the LTTE. The killer was remanded on the orders of the Mount Lavinia magistrate Mohammed Mackey. |
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