By IANS
Punalur (Kerala) : The police here have sought help from Interpol to nab a NRI, earlier living in Britain, who had allegedly feigned death so that her husband could collect insurance.
Sara Williams, earlier called Saramma Thomas, hailed from this town about 70 km from the state capital. She is now absconding after Britain’s Nat West Bank complained to the police here.
Now in her mid thirties, Sara was living in Surrey for over a decade. In 2000, her husband told Nat West Bank she had died in Kerala and made a 200,000-pound insurance claim.
The bank became suspicious and sent an official here to make enquiries at Punalur municipality, which had issued Sara’s death certificate.
The official also called on Sara’s mother and went to the home parish of her church, where there was reportedly no record of her funeral.
The bank then complained to the police, which filed a case of cheating. George Varghese, superintendent of police, told IANS that 90 percent of the investigation was over and Sara was currently named the “first accused”.
“The case was registered in 2000 and we took over the investigation in 2003. We have now charge sheeted eight people here and it includes a village council member and employees at the Punalur municipality who had helped her get a death certificate. We are now in the final stages of the investigation,” said Varghese.
A few days back, the police put out a wanted notice for Sara in all leading newspapers here, complete with her photograph.
There’s a twist in the tale: Sara’s husband, who had actually made the false claim, died in 2002.