A former Indian army officer wanted in the killing of a human rights lawyer in the disputed Kashmir region shot and killed his own wife and two of their children in their California home before apparently committing suicide, authorities said.
A 17-year-old believed to be the man’s son also was “barely alive” after the attack Saturday morning, Fresno County Sheriff’s Deputy Chris Curtice said.
The ex-officer, Avtar Singh, had been arrested in this central California city last year after his wife said he choked her, and the Indian government sought his extradition days after that in the 1996 death of Jalil Andrabi.
But he remained free, for reasons that were not immediately clear. Andrabi’s brother and lawyer blamed New Delhi, saying Singh’s family would still be alive if the government had tried harder to bring him to justice.
“These lives could have been saved if a trial of Maj. Avtar Singh was conducted on time,” said Andrabi’s brother, Arshad. “We have lost that chance now. He was a known murderer and we are appalled that he was even shielded in the United States. It’s a failure of justice at all levels.”
Singh, who owned a trucking company in Selma, called police around 6:15 a.m. Saturday and told them that he had just killed four people, Curtice said. He added that a sheriff’s SWAT team was called in to assist because of Singh’s military background and the India charges against him.
When the SWAT team entered the home they found the bodies of Singh, a woman believed to be his wife and two children, ages 3 and 15, Curtice said. All appeared to have died from gunshot wounds.
The 17-year-old suffered severe head trauma and underwent surgery at a hospital where he remained in intensive care Saturday evening, Curtice said.
Singh, 47, was arrested by Selma police in February 2011 when his wife reported that he had choked her, Selma Police Chief Myron Dyck said shortly after that arrest. Police then discovered that he was being sought in India, but Dyck said at the time that he could not keep Singh in custody on the murder charge without a warrant from international authorities.
Several days later, India requested that the United States arrest and extradite Singh. It wasn’t clear on Saturday why Singh had remained free since the request. A request for comment from the Consulate General of India in San Francisco on Saturday was not immediately returned.
Dyck didn’t immediately return a call seeking comment Saturday about the 2011 arrest, and Selma police referred questions about the apparent murder-suicide to Fresno County sheriff’s officials.
Selma police last had contact with Singh about two months ago when he called to complain that reporters wouldn’t leave him alone because of the murder warrant, Fresno County Sheriff Margaret Mims told the Fresno Bee.
Jalil Andrabi was killed at the height of protests in Indian-controlled Kashmir, where nearly a dozen rebel groups have fought security forces for independence or merger with Pakistan since 1989. More than 68,000 people, mostly civilian, have been killed in the uprising and subsequent Indian crackdown.
Andrabi disappeared in March 1996 in Kashmir’s main city, Srinagar. His body was recovered 19 days later in a local river. He had been shot in the head and his eyes were gouged out.
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