FBI handed blood, hair samples of Gulshan attackers

Samples collected from the bodies of the Gulshan cafe gunmen are with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

Staff Correspondentbdnews24.com
Published : 22 July 2016, 08:50 AM
Updated : 22 July 2016, 09:50 AM

Counter-terror officials handed over the specimens from six bodies to representatives of the US investigation agency on Friday, said Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) Deputy Commissioner Md Masudur Rahman. 

“Hair and blood samples from the five gunmen and their suspected aide have been given to the FBI for testing,” he said. 

The counter-terror unit asked for hair and 20 mililitres of blood to be collected from the bodies for a second time, Soheil Mahmud, assistant professor of Forensics Medicine at Dhaka Medical College and Hospital had said.

When asked why, he said: “We collected five mililitres of blood, teeth and flesh during autopsy. But the unit asked for more samples.”     

The gunmen, mostly in their 20s, seized the upscale cafe on the night of Jul 1, where they shot and slaughtered 20 hostages, 17 of them foreigners. 

Two police officers also died during the attack, for which the Islamic State claimed responsibility.

The government said six attackers were killed by army commandos, who stormed the cafe the next morning.

Among them, five were members of the banned Jama’aatul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), according to the police. They maintained that the sixth person, the restaurant’s chef, Saiful Chowkider, ‘was assisting the killers’.

The remains of the attackers and their alleged aide were at the mortuary of the Combined Military Hospital (CMH) in Dhaka.       

The autopsy will check if they were under the influence of amphetamine-based drugs, namely Captagon, that the IS uses to create ‘super soldiers’, Soheil Mahmud had said.