San Francisco: A 53-year-old Indian-origin IT professional has been arrested after he walked into a northern California police station along with a dead body in his car. Shankar Nagappa Hangud, a resident of Roseville, California confessed to have killed three other people, Roseville Police Department Captain Joshua Simon said. Simon declined to name the victims, but said they were all members of the suspect’s family, two adults and two juveniles. Hangud was held in custody and would face four charges of murder.
"This incident has touched the lives of many in the area," Simon told reporters, adding that such a killing had not occurred in the Placer County city of 130,000 in his recent memory. "It's a very sad, sad situation," he said. “The suspect himself drove to the Mount Shasta police department with one of the victims in his car and made a confession to them to start off this investigation,” Simon said. "It appears that the victims were killed by this suspect over a few days time span, we're still working to put that timeline together."
Mount Shasta police chief Parish Cross said he and another officer went outside to the car to verify what Hangud had said was true. Hangud told police the address where to find the three other bodies and Roseville officers checked his apartment near Sacramento and discovered the other victims, according to authorities. However, Hangud refused any interviews.
Police said they were not ready to disclose a motive for Hangud’s alleged acts; however, tax records showed that Hangud faced a federal tax lien of $178,603 from the Internal Revenue Service this year. Police believe Hangud “drove from Roseville and travelled to unknown places in northern California, and ended up in Mount Shasta,” Simon said.
Hangud was a data specialist and had worked for several companies in the Sacramento area, according to his LinkedIn profile. His most recent employment was with a company called Social Interest Solutions. The company declined to comment, but public records showed his employment there ended in 2018. Court records show that Hangud’s only previous encounter with law enforcement was for speeding in Placer County in 2016. Before 2015, Hangud worked in the technology sector in the Bay Area and had previously lived in Dallas, Texas; Maryland; and New Jersey, according to public documents.
