Former Goa minister Mickky in hot water

PANAJI: Former Goa tourism minister Mickky Pacheco has been charged with culpable homicide, not amounting to murder, abetting suicide and destruction of evidence in the Nadia Torredo death case. He has been denied anticipatory bail.

Mickky who resigned on Saturday has been on the run since then, after the crime branch summoned him for a second round of questioning. While in hiding, he applied for anticipatory bail at the Margao session court.

Nadia, a ‘close friend’ of Mickky, died on May 30 — 15 days after ‘mistakenly’ consuming large quantities of rat poison for toothpaste.

The police say that Nadia’s post-mortem report showed injury marks after being repeatedly hit with a blunt weapon.
Mickky is accused of attacking her, and then destroying the evidence, ‘the family members of the deceased and the applicant (Pacheco) have given contradictory statements suggesting a cover-up of the episode’, public prosecutor Sarojini Sardinha said.

The former minister can be arrested now with clear evidence pointing to his role in Nadia’s death. “He was supposed to come back for further investigations. Now we have sounded an alert,” said police spokesman Atmaram Deshpande.

Police have also accused Torrado’s family of distorting evidence, conspiring with Mickky, and of accepting Rs 35 lakh as bribe from him after her death.

Her family, however, claim the money was paid by Mickky as hospital charges for Nadia’s treatment in Mumbai and Chennai.

Police also blame Nadia’s mother Sonia of disrupting evidence that point to Mickky’s involvement in the case. Sources add that the senior Torredo is likely to be arrested in connection with the case.

A maid of the Torredo family is said to have told the police that she was asked to burn all evidence of Nadia, including bed sheets, pillows, clothes and documents present in the room. Nadia’s personal stuff including mobile, laptop and medical records were burnt even before her funeral.

Earlier in his divorce petition, Nadia’s estranged husband Wilson Barretto had blamed Mickky for ruining the couple’s marital life. Police also claim to have in possession previous boarding pass of Nadia in which she is named as the wife of this former tourism minister. To understand the nature of relationship with Nadia, police opposed Mickky’s anticipatory bail plea.

Besides Mickky, session court on Wednesday denied anticipatory bail to Mickky’s close aide and Officer on Special Duty (Tourism) Lyndon Monterio.

Lyndon, summoned by the crime branch for questioning, is suspected to have played a prime role in distorting evidence.