15-year-old Pune girl fakes Instagram romance to kidnap and kill teen boy

• 15-year-old girl detained for role in Pune teen's kidnapping and murder
• Girl allegedly used Instagram to lure victim into a fake relationship
• Police arrested five adults and detained four minors in connection with the case

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A 15-year-old girl has been detained by Pune City Police in connection with the kidnapping and murder of a 17-year-old boy, with investigators alleging she deliberately used her Instagram profile to ensnare him in a fabricated relationship as part of a deadly conspiracy.

The girl, described as a school dropout, is the ninth suspect apprehended in the case. She was presented before the Juvenile Justice Board two days ago and remanded to an observation home, police said, as reported by The Indian Express.

The grim sequence began when the victim’s mother approached police on December 31, reporting her son missing since he left home on his two-wheeler two days prior. Given the boy was a minor, a kidnapping case was registered the same day against unidentified persons.

A parallel probe by police teams and Crime Branch Unit 3 quickly led investigators to four initial suspects. “Probe revealed that the deceased used to trouble some of the accused. The suspects had been nursing grudges against him and hatched a conspiracy to murder him,” a police officer was quoted by The Indian Express as saying.

Finding the suspects absent from Pune, police used technical leads to trace them to Belgaum in Karnataka. A team was dispatched and the four were detained. During interrogation, they confessed to kidnapping and murdering the teenager.

This breakthrough led to the arrest of two of the suspects, while the other two, being minors, were detained. Subsequently, three more suspects were arrested and another minor detained. Based on information extracted, police located, exhumed and recovered the victim’s buried body.

The investigation took a critical turn two days ago with leads pointing to the teenage girl’s alleged central role in the plot. According to an officer involved in the probe, the girl knowingly used her social media presence to trap the victim.

According to the investigating officer, the probe has shown that the girl knowingly used her Instagram profile to ensnare the victim in a false romantic relationship. She then allegedly lured him to a specific location on December 29, where the other accused kidnapped him before murdering him and burying his body to conceal the crime.

Police have now arrested five youths aged between 19 and their early twenties and detained four minors including the 15-year-old girl.