Seven suspects who attempted to take ownership of a two-storey house at Fair Hill Park in Borella belonging to a deceased specialist doctor by threatening the residents with a toy pistol have been arrested by the Borella Police.

The police said a woman who is an aunt of a deceased underworld gang leader named “Wanathe Olcott” was also among the arrested.

The specialist doctor passed away a few days ago and his son, who lives in California, had returned to the US after performing last rites.

A few days after the funeral, a woman who came to the Borella Police had said that she is from Kandy and that the house was sold to her for Rs.8 million by the doctor and that she was moving into the house.

Sub-Inspector Sriyaratne Kuruppuarachchi, OIC of Borella Police’s Minor Complaint Division, who refused her request, informed the woman not to move in until an investigation is conducted and to file a complaint in this regard first.

Borella Police officers who went to the house to investigate the complaint had questioned a person who had taken care of all the affairs of the doctor and the house for many years. He had said that the doctor had not sold the house to anyone and that he had been given this house and land by a power of attorney on the condition that he should hand it over to the doctor’s son upon his request.

When this complaint was scheduled to be heard today (13), a group of seven people had visited the house and threatened the resident in the house with firearms and ordered him to leave.

Subsequently, the police arrested the suspects and it has been revealed that they have used a fake pistol to threaten the residents.

Further investigations revealed that the suspects had gone to the house on the request of deceased underworld leader Wanathe Olcott’s aunt.

The officers of the Minor Complaints Division including Sub-Inspector Sriyaratne Kuruppuarachchi are conducting further investigations under the instructions of Borella Police Chief Inspector A.J.M.R. Samarasinghe.

(Aruna)