New Delhi:
A notorious serial killer infamous as ‘Doctor Death’ was arrested by Delhi Police after he jumped parole last year, a senior official said on Tuesday.
The criminal was arrested a day before from an ashram in Rajasthan’s Dausa, where he was posing as a priest under a false identity, he said.
An Ayurveda practitioner-turned-criminal, 67-year-old Devender Sharma was convicted in multiple murder cases and was notorious for dumping his victims’ bodies in the crocodile-infested waters of Hazara Canal at Kasganj in Uttar Pradesh.
He was sentenced to life imprisonment in seven separate cases across Delhi, Rajasthan and Haryana, and a Gurgaon court has even awarded him the capital punishment.
Deputy Commissioner of Police (Crime Branch) Aditya Gautam said Devender Sharma, a BAMS (bachelor of ayurvedic medicine and surgery) degree holder, had been serving life sentence in Tihar Jail for the brutal killings of several taxi and truck drivers between 2002 and 2004, when he jumped parole in August 2023.
“Sharma and his accomplices used to call drivers for fake trips, murder them and sell their vehicles in the grey market,” DCP Gautam said. The bodies were then thrown into the Hazara Canal, known for its crocodile population, to erase all evidence.
The officer said Sharma has a long criminal history involving at least 27 cases of murder, kidnapping and robbery.
He first gained notoriety for running an illicit kidney transplant racket between 1998 and 2004. He had confessed to facilitating more than 125 illegal transplants with the help of doctors and middlemen operating in several states.
Sharma turned to crime after incurring heavy financial losses in a failed gas dealership deal in 1994. A year later, he began running a fake gas agency and subsequently entered the illegal organ trade. His criminal pursuits then expanded to targeted killings of taxi drivers. The modus operandi involved hiring taxis, murdering the drivers, and selling their vehicles in the grey market. The bodies were fed to crocodiles.
Sharma was arrested in 2004 in connection with both the kidney racket and the serial killings.
“He was sentenced to life imprisonment in seven separate murder cases across Delhi, Rajasthan and Haryana, and even received the death penalty from a Gurgaon court in one case. Police believe he was responsible for over 50 murders,” said the officer.
During his time as a fugitive, Sharma was living in disguise as a priest at an ashram in Rajasthan’s Dausa.
“Sharma had jumped parole in August 2023 while serving his sentence at Tihar Jail and had been on the run since. Crime branch was tasked to search for him. Following a six-month-long operation spanning several cities including Aligarh, Jaipur, Delhi, Agra and Prayagraj, the team tracked him to an ashram in Dausa, where he was posing as a spiritual man under a false identity,” said the DCP.
This is not the first time Sharma has absconded while on parole. In 2020, he failed to return after a 20-day parole and remained at large for seven months before being caught in Delhi. In June 2023, he was granted parole again for two months in a case registered at Sarita Vihar police station, but he disappeared after August 3, 2023.
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