'Mummy still doesn't know that her son has passed away. As we speak, she is still in the ICU. We don't know how to break the news to her," said an emotional David Nehemiah, a colonel in the Indian Army whose brother Lloyd died after being beaten by three IT professionals in Bengaluru on Sunday, 2 April.
Lloyd Nehemiah, 54, and his sister were looking after their 80-year-old mother, who had undergone spine surgery two weeks ago and was in post-operative care, when they heard extremely loud music being played in the dead of the night on Sunday in Bengaluru's Vignan Nagar neighbourhood.
"The three accused were playing jarring music and yelling expletives way beyond midnight. Since my mother was unwell, obviously she got disturbed by it," David, who is seven years younger than Lloyd, told The Quint.
Lloyd then stepped out of his house to ask the three men to tone down the volume, following which they started beating him in an alleged inebriated state.
'They Slapped My Sister, Tried To Enter My House Forcefully'
David said that the trio used logs and other things to beat his brother "black-and-blue."
Watching what was unfolding, Lloyd's sister – who is a co-complainant in the case – rushed down and tried to prevent the men from beating her brother. But then they slapped her, too, and followed them back to their house and tried to enter it forcefully.
"Who plays loud music at 4:00 in the morning? That's time even for dead bodies to sleep," David told The Quint.
In the morning, Lloyd went to the police station and filed a First Information Report (FIR) over the incident. He also called his brother, who was stationed in Kashmir at the time, to tell him what had transpired.
"My brother told me in the morning that they were taking mummy to the hospital since her condition had worsened overnight," he said.
David then came down from Kashmir to look after his mother, who had been taken to the ICU. That is when things started to take an unfortunate turn for Lloyd.
"Lloyd's health was fine on 2 April, but on 3 April his leg started swelling. He had received a lot of blows on his leg and was also suffering from breathing problems and other complications, including having trouble sitting up and lying down."David Nehemiah
When he heard of Lloyd's complications, David left the hospital after midnight on Monday, 3 April, to attend to his brother, following which the latter had to be admitted to the hospital as well.
Several procedures were conducted to save Lloyd, but his condition kept deteriorating. In the evening when he was being shifted to another nursing home, he passed away.
While the postmortem report is awaited, David said that what he observed was that his brother had extensive bruises on his legs and hands, and a black eye.
When asked whether he knew the accused, David said that he did not, but incidents involving loud music had occurred late at night 2-3 times before.
"Maybe my brother knew them or had seen them. This incident had happened before, when some individuals played blaring loud music in the early hours and yelled expletives, not caring about the sentiments of other people. But I don't know whether the same three accused persons were involved," he told The Quint.
'My Brother Needs Justice – The Sooner the Better'
David said that he had been told by the police that two of the accused techies had been nabbed from Bengaluru and one from Delhi.
The three accused, identified as Ram Samanth Rai, Abhishek Singh, and Basudev Samanth Rai, have been booked by the Bengaluru Police under Sections 302 (murder), 354 (assault or use of criminal force against any woman), 323 (punishment for voluntarily causing hurt) of the Indian Penal Code, The Indian Express reported.
"However, this is just the beginning," David said. "The legal system takes its own time and I have confidence that we will get justice. My brother needs justice for what happened – the sooner the better."
He, however, added that the pursuit for justice won't be easy.
"My sister-in-law will be staying with and looking after my aged mother. I won’t be here because I will be stationed elsewhere. You can understand the complications now. I don’t know if they will be able to run around this loop to pursue justice," David said.
Several family members and close friends gave speeches remembering Lloyd during his funeral ceremony, which was held on Thursday, 6 April.
"Lloyd was bright-eyed, eager, and hyperactive. He was a live-wire presence. He was a very restless person and extremely thoughtful in his actions," Kiran Sebastian, one of his close friends, said.
She also said that Lloyd would rescue the most "vulnerable of victims" – whether they were human beings, animals or even plants.
Lloyd leaves behind his wife and two children, aged 27 and 32.
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