Live Online Murder, Part 3 – The Action

Read Part I here -> https://storymirror.com/read/english/story/live-online-murder-part-i-the-act/p93e5vc3

Read Part II here > https://storymirror.com/read/english/story/live-online-murder-part-2-the-actors/rbrctgra

Mr. Mike was murdered Live while presenting his first quarterly business update to the stakeholders. Samarth and his team spent whole night looking at various clues and digital footprints. It's 9 am, shell-shocked staff was asked to assemble in common area. Police did a good job by ensuring that no media or influential person enters the building.

Samarth addressing the gathering.

“My friends, I know it’s been a tough night for you all. However, let me assure you that the trouble you have undergo last night has yield its fruits. We believe we have culprits identified.”

Samarth continues after a brief pause,

“18 minutes into the call, Raghu enters Mr. Mike’s office to serve him coffee. He says there was no one else in the room, let me tell you he was wrong. Mike was murder at 25th minute of the call. When Rita and Shruthi reached the crime scene there was no one else and no coffee in the cup. Again, they were wrong. Ms. Rita. When was Mr. Mike’s new office inaugurated? “

Rita, “two days back. Mike was very particular about the dates, he wanted to have first business update from his new office.”

Samarth “that’s why we still see office cluttered. Not all things were arranged properly. I guess two days were not sufficient?”

Rita “Yes and No. It was indeed challenging timelines, but vendor lost few keys due to which we could not keep lots of stuff in the cabinets.”

Samarth “Shruthi you were near Rita’s office, and you had some work to discuss with Rita. What was it?”

Shruthi, “it was about few candidates who had applied for senior position, and I wanted Mike’s time to take final round of interview.”

Samarth, “Senior candidates who came for interview few days back and looks like some of them stayed back. There was a candidate who appeared in the interview with fake name and fake experience and entered the premises only to stay back. Why stay back? Because this outsider was paid to punish Mike in public and knew from someone insider about the conference call. My colleagues, Suresh and Kamath are live in Mike’s room and let’s see what they have for us.”

On a large screen in the gathering room, staff saw Suresh and Kamath in Mr. Mike’s office presenting live. Suresh and Kamath were ready for the role play.

Suresh, “as you all can see, Kamath is now seated where Mike was seated, and consider me as murderer, I come from behind, kill mike and step back and turn around to hide in this cabinet, it’s the same cabinet whose keys were missing, and see the magic, I can now open the cabinet without the keys….”

On opening the door, Suresh was stunned. There was a man seated sideways in the cabinet with no reaction. He had put on long gloves, his head was on his knees and his body barely had any movements.

Kamath quickly checks on him, “He is dead Sir. I am sorry we should have checked this earlier.”

Samarth, taking a deep breath and pausing for few seconds.

Samarth, “I thought we will capture him live. But No don’t be sorry. He was dead long before you and I entered this office, and I will explain you in a while why and how? You may please close the door and do necessary arrangements.”

Samarth continues, “Friends, this person pretended as a candidate and entered office few days back. He was hired to kill; he is a professional but not the mastermind.”

Rajan, one of the board of directors, “This is shocking. However, I still do not understand if cabinets keys were lost, how did the Killer stepped out to kill Mike?”

Samarth there are two individuals involved here, one who unlocked the cabinet and other one was supposed to lock it back. He is the one who opened the cabinet, he had one key, pointing his finger .. “That guy.” It was Raghu, already nailed by the police. He unlocked the door after serving coffee. If you look at the recording, 20 seconds after Raghu keeps coffee on the table, you hear a fine knock sound, that’s when he unlocked the cabinet so killer can execute his plan.”

Rajan “ …. And who locked him back.”

Samarth, “Well for some reason the person who was supposed to lock did not get the chance to lock cabinet in which killer was hiding and as a result you can see Suresh was able to open the cabinet without any trouble. This person is one who wanted to make this financial briefing of Mike a memorable one. It was he who set up this virtual background on Mike’s system without Mike even realizing that he had virtual background. It was he who arranged for interviews of senior roles and ensured that a black sheep stays back in the premises. It was he who wanted to be the CEO, one who was front runner for this post but had to compromise as Mike was hired by the board for the CEO position.”

The last clue was good enough for everyone to guess that it was John, Chief operating officer who masterminded this murder. Leaving everyone stunned that a person of his caliber and wisdom can play that dirty.

John “I am sorry, but board made a mockery of me by appointing Mike. My loyalty and contributions were ignored, having said that, you will find it very difficult to prove this in the court of law that it was me.”

Samarth, “Don’t worry Mr John, we have done our homework. From your past locations, phone records, fingerprints, CCTV recordings of office and outside and lastly DNA analysis, we have all of these. We will be able to prove your motive and role. Inspector he is all yours.”

Rajan “I still have few open questions Mr Samarth. When did the killer entered the cabinet, for how long he was locked there, and what’s the reason of his death?”

Samarth “Pallavi and Das have answers for you.”

Das, “Killer’s name is Raghav and he was hired by John to kill Mike. John prepared a fake resume of him to get entry to the office. When we tallied all entries and exits of last two weeks, we found there were two entries without exit. When studied in detail we found that it was Raghav who never exited from the office. We then started looking at the CCTV camera and realized that it was John who introduced Raghav to Raghu in cafeteria and then Raghu took Raghav to service area where he locked him up in the cabinet meant to be shifted to Mike’s office. It was here when Raghu entered service area with help of office key but had to enter office again from the main door as there was no way he could have entered office again from service area. So, Raghu had one additional entry of his in the system. Raghu then kept one key with him and handed over one to John. For two days, Raghav was locked, Raghu supported him with food supplies and at night freed him to relax. We started doubting Raghu when we realized that he was needlessly overstaying in the office. System logs and CCTV camera suggested that his movements were not normal like other days, so we tracked his phone, and checked his locations as well.”

Pallavi, “To ensure no one opens the cabinet John was supposed to lock it after the murder but he could not. His eventual plan was to ask everyone to move out of Mike’s office and then free Raghav but that failed due to Rita’s plan.”

Rita, “What plan?”

Pallavi, “When Raghu was taking coffee to Mr. Mike’s office, on his way you stopped him and asked him for some coffee for yourself. You then smartly added poison tablets to Mike’s coffee. This plan Ms Rita, plan to kill Mike. There is no escape Rita, we have recovered the pills from your office, very soon an expert will be able to verify your fingerprints on the bottle. Your phone location is often seen near Biohen labs, someone who works there helped you with this bottle. We have a team already dispatched to nab your friend. So, speak up now.”

Rita, “yes it was me. I poisoned the coffee, but when I saw that Mike was murdered, I wanted to hide that cup, but Shruti was just behind me and then few seconds later John was there as well. I could not do much …..”

Pallavi interrupts, “….. yes and you staying back foiled John’s plan. Rita stayed back and John could not lock the cabinet again. John was waiting for Rita to go out of the room while Rita was waiting for John to leave Mike’s office. Looking at both of you Shruthi stayed back and few mins later Rajan too was in Mike’s office.”

Pallavi continues, “Well, looks like since Raghav was locked up for long in cabinet he was tempted by coffee and could not resist. This temptation took Raghav’s life.”

Rajan, “But then we saw Raghu keeping coffee but never saw Raghav having it. Why?”

Pallavi, “that’s because Raghu served the coffee from the side of the table, well within the 2 feet range and Raghav had coffee from behind. If you notice properly, Coffee cup is not seen in the video, it disappears in the background after Raghu keeps it on the side table.”

Samarth, “So John could never lock cabinet as a result Suresh and Kamath were able to open it without the key. Now, the question is why was Rita keen on killing Mr. Mike?”

Rita, “Me being executive secretary to Mr Mike had uninterrupted access to his office. Few days back, I saw printouts next to his personal printer which had list of employees to be laid-off. It featured my name as well. I had learned about his aggressive and brutal working style from few of his ex-staff and I did not want to lose my job and hence I decided to poison him on the day when he was supposed to announce layoffs. His plan was to announce layoffs towards the end, and I knew Mike needed coffee every hour. So, I made this plan of adding few poison pills to his coffee, unfortunately it was consumed by someone else.”

One person was murdered, one was accidently killed and four were arrested. Old fox Samarth and his team solved a very high-profile case within 20 hours, that too with enough evidence and digital footprints to keep culprits behind the bar for long.

There are many reasons why a person can take wrong step but there is one simple reason why that person should not, and it is “You are no one to punish anyone”. In the world full of competition, aggression, and hate, at times it becomes difficult stay positive, but if you for some reason get carried away always remember that there is someone smarter and more intelligent then you who would never let you run away free, just like old fox and his team.

Absum