GUILTY CA - Jay, 56, & Karishma Dhanak, 20, murdered, Anaheim Hills, 21 May 2007

May 22, 2007, 9:08 AM PDT

Authorities tried to determine today if a link exists between a suspicious fire at Anaheim home and the discovery on a nearby lawn of a woman in her 50s bearing signs of a severe assault.

The fire broke out around 11 last night ... Firefighters had the blaze under control at 11:37 p.m. When responders arrived at the home, they found a severely assaulted woman on the lawn of the home next door, said Anaheim Police Sgt. Rick Martinez. He said her injuries were not life-threatening.

A family of four resides at the home that caught fire, he said, adding that one man and two girls were unaccounted for this morning, and that the injured woman appeared to be the fourth family member.

Police were unsure of the connection between the fire and the woman's injuries this morning, and arson and assault detectives were at the scene, Martinez said.

http://ktla.trb.com/news/ktla-anaheimfire,0,3887050.story?coll=ktla-home-1

What's even more disturbing is the discovery of the two burned bodies on the bike path in Irvine! Wondering if it has anything to do with the missing girls from this house???

http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/homepage/abox/article_1702750.php

looks like they are about 21 miles appart Could be.

Very close and there is little to no crime in Irvine. Especially anything that would be so random.

Looks like the are connected

http://www.knbc.com/news/13364528/detail.html?dl=mainclick

if i was the mom i am not sure i would ever want to wake up.

This story is leading our news out here. What a sad story

So far they have identified the lady on the lawn as the mother. She was being beaten by two men according to neighbors who witnessed the crime last night. The mother is in the hospital in critical condition. The bodies found in Irvine, one has been identified as the 20 year old daughter. The father is still missing and could be the other body. They have found the other daughter and she is alive and well.

They are saying at this point that the other body is that of a man.

KrisNine said:

This story is leading our news out here. What a sad story

So far they have identified the lady on the lawn as the mother. She was being beaten by two men according to neighbors who witnessed the crime last night. The mother is in the hospital in critical condition. The bodies found in Irvine, one has been identified as the 20 year old daughter. The father is still missing and could be the other body. They have found the other daughter and she is alive and well.

They are saying at this point that the other body is that of a man.

Click to expand...

Thanks for connecting these up for us, Kris!

i havent seen the local news, so this is all i know so far .... but it is soooooo strange. when i saw the video at the first link you posted, the LE was saying that the bodies were so badly burned that identification would be difficult .... now to find out they are connected .... since the fire in the house in anaheim was extinguished within a half-hour, it doesnt seem likely the bodies could have been burned there .... and i wont be surprised if there is a UC Irvine connection, because of the two being dumped at the path near that university.

obviously, the witness of the neighbor w/b significant timing-wise, but i almost wonder whether there were two perps involved .... my first hunch is a possible connection with some kind of gang activity (russian or vietnamese, depending on the nationality of the victims) .... witness might be the only reason the woman is still alive ....

God bless both of them!

this is a bad one .... might be a revenge killing!


p.s. what tv channel have you seen most of the coverage on, Kris? ktla?

This was on our own local KCAL news at noon. The stories are confusing, IMO. What they said in our news was that the father and daughter were seen being ushered away from the home by two men in a car.

They said they think the man is the father but he was too badly burned to tell for sure.

They also said when LE were coming up from the side of the road after discovering the burned bodies, they were carrying large 'bolt cutters,' and bags of evidence.

From what it looked like, the officer also had a piece of chain or padlock in his hand.

I haven't read the other articles. Gotta run daughter to work, I'll check in a little later.

JMHO
fran

Found Karishma's myspace but it is set to private. A picture of two girls who look very much alike.

Shadow205 said:

Found Karishma's myspace but it is set to private. A picture of two girls who look very much alike.

http://www.myspace.com/karishmaxo​

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No doubt about it, they were beautiful girls. now 1 Here's a link of the latest story from our local paper. I'm sure tomorrow it'll be more detailed.

JMHO
fran


http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/homepage/abox/article_1702730.php

............snip..............

Earlier across the street, neighbor Linda Tufts said she and her son came out to the patio after they noticed a fire was raging. She saw someone rolling something on the ground like sod, but she found out later it was the woman.

When a man spotted them, he called out something like, “They are out in front,” and then two people jumped in a van and took off, Tufts said.

Ironic point, the OCRegister Online this morning's big headline was something like "Irvine still on top list of Safest Cities."

Irvine is where they found the two charred remains.

fran

What a tragic story! Prayers for the mother's condition to improve, and for the family and friends of this family.

From article linked above:

Traffic surveillance cameras monitor the intersection adjacent to where the bodies were found, but it's unknown if they were recording the events at the time before and after the fire, Handfield said.

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More at OCRegister.com

Hoping that the surveillance cameras were recording during that time, to give LE some more evidence.

Here's a picture of the 20 year old daughter, Karishma, (what a beautiful young woman), may she rest in peace.

Seven said:

Thanks for connecting these up for us, Kris!

i havent seen the local news, so this is all i know so far .... but it is soooooo strange. when i saw the video at the first link you posted, the LE was saying that the bodies were so badly burned that identification would be difficult .... now to find out they are connected .... since the fire in the house in anaheim was extinguished within a half-hour, it doesnt seem likely the bodies could have been burned there .... and i wont be surprised if there is a UC Irvine connection, because of the two being dumped at the path near that university.

obviously, the witness of the neighbor w/b significant timing-wise, but i almost wonder whether there were two perps involved .... my first hunch is a possible connection with some kind of gang activity (russian or vietnamese, depending on the nationality of the victims) .... witness might be the only reason the woman is still alive ....

God bless both of them!

this is a bad one .... might be a revenge killing!


p.s. what tv channel have you seen most of the coverage on, Kris? ktla?

Click to expand...

You know what's really strange, Seven, is that the surviving daughter is thought to be a student as UC Irvine. That's what they were saying on the news. I wonder if they were heading that way?

I was watching the coverage on KNBC, believe it or not.

Sorry to say this, but IMHO, it looks like the dad may have gotten into business with the wrong people. There are some people you just don't mess with. They don't just want revenge on you, they'll take out the whole family.

What a shame, a senseless crime. I pray LE keeps the remaining daughter safe.

fran

http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/homepage/abox/article_1702876.php

Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Father of slain woman was jailed for fraud
Anaheim Hills resident Jayprakash Dhanak served time in prison for mail fraud.
By Gwendolyn Driscoll
The Orange County Register
An Anaheim Hills man described as "softspoken" and "very devout" but who also had a history of legal problems and debt is at the center of an unfolding mystery involving suspected arson, assault and murder.

Jayprakash Dhanak, 56, an Indian immigrant who served more than two years in prison after pleading guilty to mail fraud in 2003, is missing after a fire broke out around 11 Monday night at his East Camino Correr house in Anaheim Hills.

The body of his daughter, Karishma Dhanak, 20, has been identified as one of two bodies discovered near an Irvine bike trail early this morning after a fire. Police have not said if the other body is Dhanak's.

Dhanak's wife, Leela, 53, was found badly beaten near the couple's burning home last night. Another daughter, Shayoma, was living elsewhere and is alive.

Dhanak pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud in 2003 for illegally overbilling the U.S. Postal Service for millions of dollars of mail he handled as a manager of a Santa Ana direct mail business, Mastersort. According to his lawyer at the time, Rafael Bernardino, he served up to two and a half years in prison and faced a $2.5 million fine. The company, for which both he and his wife worked, agreed to repay the $3 million that prosecutors say the company netted from 1995 to 1997.

The couple lived in a two-story, 2,000-square-foot house that they bought with a $510,000 loan in 2005.

I agree, Fran. Not that it would be justified to kill the father in this manner, but to hurt the daughter, who had nothing to do with her families business is just a shame.

I know they aren't releasing the name of the hospital where the mom is recuperating, so hopefully the LE will do a good job protecting the daughter.

So the father was involved in mail fraud. That doesnt seem like something anyone would want revenge for. I mean it's not like drug money or whatever. I never heard of gangsters saying oooooooooh I will kill your family you did mail fraud!. You know what i'm sayin?! There has to be more to this story, has to be something else. I saw the picture of the daughter and wow what a beautiful beautiful girl. I wonder if the neighbors who witnessed the beating of the mother are now in danger since the thugs saw them?

From Fran's link:

In 2007, his wife, Leela, was described as a "registered agent" for a Los Angeles company called North America Gaming LLC.

Could this be connected to gambling? I'm not familiar with that company.

This reminds me of a program I saw on television once about men in India who have been spurned by a family when they request marriage. The man or men will break in people's homes and burn the daughter with acid. I've also seen programs where Indian wives are burned with fire.

What a tragedy for someone to end the life of that beautiful girl and for nothing. It sounds like she was really a brilliant girl with a great future ahead of her. I wish she hadn't been at home that day. I too hope that LE is protecting the other daughter. It just might be that the killers didn't know where she was that day but now they do thanks to the news articles. I hope that LE realize that the killers could easily go after her.

That poor mom. It was said that her injurys aren't life threatening but she is in critical condition in ICU. I wonder how soon she will be able to talk to LE. I hope that she remembers what happened and maybe what they looked like.

I wonder if the two men who ran to the van were of the same nationality as the family. Maybe dad had borrowed money from some crook and couldn't pay it back. I'll bet that is the dad that died with the daughter.

People said that the dad kept to himself and didn't talk to people. It sounds like he had seperated himself from the rest of the family. Sounds like something was going on in his life but not in the lives of the females in the family. I wonder if his wife even knew what was going on. I can't imagine how anyone could pay their monthly debts and then that fine the husband owed. I'll bet dad owed someone money and they collected. So sad.