Gov. Phil Murphy asks the Indian government for help in bringing accused killer of Maple Shade mother and son to trial
In a letter to the Indian ambassador, Gov. Phil Murphy said Nazeer Hameed should return from his native India to South Jersey to face justice in the 2017 crime.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy has asked the Indian government to extradite an accused murderer to South Jersey to face criminal charges in the death of a woman and her son in Maple Shade.
Nazeer Hameed, 38, was charged last month with killing Sasikala Narra and her 6-year-old son, Anish, in a crime that shocked the community because of its brutality.
Narra and her son were found stabbed to death inside their home at the Fox Meadow Apartments in March 2017. The two suffered violent stab and slice wounds to their head and hands, and Anish was nearly decapitated in the attack, prosecutors said.
Hanumantha Rao Narra, Narra’s husband and the boy’s father, found the bodies, prosecutors said.
Investigators said Hameed waited until the woman and child were alone in the house before attacking them. Afterward, prosecutors said, Hameed fled to his native India and has remained there ever since.
In a letter to Vinay Kwatra, the Indian ambassador to America, Murphy said it was important that Hameed face justice.
“This heinous crime shocked our state, and for eight years investigators pursued every available lead,” the governor said.
“This request reflects not only the seriousness of the alleged offenses, but also the enduring spirit of cooperation between India and the United States in upholding the rule of law and combating violent crime.”
In announcing the charges last month, Burlington County LaChia Bradshaw said Hameed worked at the same company as Hanumantha Rao Narra, and lived near the family in their apartment complex. For weeks before the killings, Bradshaw said, Hameed “stalked” the family and took measures to hide his movements.
She declined to describe the potential motive for the slayings.
Local, state, and federal investigators worked the case for nearly a decade, and ultimately connected Hameed to the crime through a single drop of blood they say he left at the crime scene.
Last year, a sample of Hameed’s DNA was finally obtained when the company Hameed works for shipped his personal laptop to South Jersey. DNA found on the computer matched the blood found at the crime scene in 2017, according to investigators.