The DPD Murder Part 4: Killers on the Run

Operation Columbia is the ongoing investigation into the murder of 23-year-old DPD delivery driver Aurman Singh, who was ambushed and killed by a gang of eight masked men on a Shrewsbury street. Five men have already been convicted - and featured in series 2 of Murder 24/7 - but four suspects escaped in a white Mercedes, and DCI Mark Bellamy's team must now find them before the trail goes cold.

With no witness able to identify the fugitives from the attack itself, the investigation turns to CCTV. Footage from the getaway route, a nearby train station, and the home address of one of the convicted killers gradually builds a picture of the four men. Through painstaking analysis of phone records, ANPR cameras and social media, three suspects are identified: Harpreet Singh, Sehajpal Singh and Mehakdeep Singh. A fourth suspect, Harwinder Singh Turna, is identified after border force records reveal he has fled the country.

The Serious Organised Crime Unit launches surveillance operations alongside DCI Bellamy’s team. But as days pass, the team faces mounting frustration. Raids on multiple addresses draw a blank. Covert tracking of a van believed to be used by one suspect ends in disappointment when the driver turns out not to be their man.

Then a breakthrough, the discovery of financial data. A bank card used at a train station coffee shop, and later a workplace vending machine, leads detectives to Austria, where Sehajpal and Mehakdeep appear to have settled and are now working at a local delivery depot. Austrian police confirm their location, identities and photographs and an arrest operation is planned to apprehend them in Austria and extradite them to the UK.