Deaths at hotel: Murder case filed, one arrested

One person was arrested in a murder case filed yesterday over the death of a couple and their son in a hotel in Dhaka's Moghbazar on Sunday morning.

The arrested is Rafiqul Islam, a distant uncle of Monir Hossain, one of the victims, said Golam Faruk, officer-in-charge of Ramna Police Station.

Rafiqul was the caretaker of the victims' house in Keraniganj.

Meanwhile, a Dhaka court granted a two-day remand for him when he was produced before it with a seven-day remand prayer, court sources said.

Police had detained him for questioning shortly after the incident as he was the one who brought the food from the nearby restaurant on the evening before their death.

The OC said they will interrogate him thoroughly during remand.

Nurul Amin Manik, brother of one of the deceased, Monir Hossain, filed the case earlier in the day with Ramna Police Station.

In the case statement, Manik claimed that unknown persons mixed poison or something poisonous with the food supplied to Monir, his wife, and son in an attempt to embezzle their property by killing them.

The victims – Monir Hossain, 48, an expatriate; his wife Nasrin Akter Swapna, 38; and their son Nayeem Hossain, 18, who had physical disabilities -- had travelled to Dhaka from Ramganj in Lakshmipur on Saturday for the boy's medical treatment.

Failing to consult a doctor, they checked into a hotel in Moghbazar later that day and were found dead the following morning.

According to police, the family members became ill at the hotel, hours after having dinner brought in from a nearby restaurant.

Masud Alam, deputy commissioner of Ramna Division, on Monday said, "Initial findings and doctors' observations suggest that poison caused their deaths. But we need to determine whether it was food poisoning or if someone deliberately mixed poison into their food."

Blood and viscera have been collected from the bodies and sent for further tests. Once we have those reports, we will know the actual reason behind the deaths.