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Charges baffle suspect’s friends…Another arrest in Dhanak killings….If convicted, Iftekhar Murtaza — whose only known brushes with the law had been speeding tickets — could face the death penalty or life in prison without parole. Man Tied To Anaheim Hills Murders Back In O.C. Murtaza to be charged or released. Murtaza, a Bangla deshi Guy– who had never been to court as an adult for anything more serious than a speeding ticket – appeared before an Arizona judge Thursday as a “person of interest” in the slaying of his on-again-off-again girlfriend’s father and sister in Orange County.

Some how I know both of them. I have seen them in couple of occations. This is a true story and I have tried to collect all their news. The followings are the news I have collected from several news papers and blogs.
Latest (July 9th)
Man held in Anaheim Hills slayings is said to be kind, and lacking any motive to hurt family.
When defending Vitaliy Krasnoperov, a West Hollywood man charged in connection with two slayings and a beating so brutal that they have drawn nationwide attention, friends often mention his motorcycle and his mother.
The 21-year-old, who was working at a loan company and planning to enroll in community

college, lived with his mother, Tatyana, and their black cat, Benny, in a small San Vicente Boulevard apartment. It was where Krasnoperov told friends he was couch-bound on May 21 while recovering from a motorcycle accident.
That night, about 45 miles south in Anaheim Hills, a woman was beaten unconscious, her home set on fire and her husband and older daughter viciously killed and dumped in a park in Irvine, their bodies set ablaze. The woman’s younger daughter, who was not home when the attacks occurred, had recently ended her relationship with a 22-year-old Van Nuys man named Iftekhar Murtaza — Krasnoperov’s co-worker and friend.
Murtaza and Krasnoperov have been charged with two counts of murder, one count of attempted murder and special-circumstances allegations that could make both men subject to the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole. On Friday, their arraignments were continued until Aug. 10.
During Krasnoperov’s hearing in Orange County Superior Court, his mother and about a half-dozen relatives and friends scooted to the edge of their chairs to catch a glimpse of him as he talked with his attorney from behind a transparent partition.
“He’s OK. He’s OK,” the attorney, Dmitry Gurovich of Sherman Oaks, said after Friday’s hearing. “He’s absolutely shocked about the arrest.”
Krasnoperov has thus far proven to be an enigmatic figure. He appears to have no direct link to the victims, and authorities, citing the ongoing investigation, have yet to publicly explain his alleged involvement.
His friends are baffled. “What would be his motive for wanting to murder a family?” asked Inna Zazulevskaya, 22, a recent UC San Diego graduate who said she has known him since sixth grade.
Krasnoperov and his mother emigrated from Ukraine when he was a boy, she said. He was a class clown with “thousands of jokes” who speaks Russian and English and is handy with computers. Even though he had a fever, he had helped Zazulevskaya move to San Diego. “He’s like a brother,” she said. He “makes you laugh and gets overprotective.”
A “very mannered” guy who opened doors for women and offered them his jacket when the weather was cold, Krasnoperov is close to his mother, who works at a Beverly Hills spa and at one point ran a limousine company, public records show.
Olga Gritsenko, a family acquaintance, told The Times in an e-mail that Krasnoperov made sure his mom got flowers for Mother’s Day, which “shows that Vitaliy is a wonderful son and a loving person with a good heart.”
“Vitaliy is a polite young man, who always offered to help me carry my groceries from the car,” she said. “I am lucky to know such a nice, caring young man and am proud of knowing him,” Gritsenko wrote.
After graduating from high school, Krasnoperov took some college courses and lived in Northern California and New York before returning to Southern California about two years ago. “He missed his mom,” Zazulevskaya said.
While mulling taking classes at Santa Monica College in hopes of transferring to UCLA, Krasnoperov began working at Murtaza’s loan company in Van Nuys. The two were friends who worked out and partied together, friends said.
It is unclear how well Krasnoperov knew Murtaza’s girlfriend of three years, Shayona Dhanak, an 18-year-old UC Irvine student. Dhanak ended the relationship with Murtaza this spring at the behest of her devoutly Hindu family, who had frowned on her dating a Muslim, according to court documents. Murtaza had told friends he wanted to work out the conflict with Dhanak’s parents and eventually marry her.
On May 21, just before midnight, authorities arrived at the Dhanaks’ burning Anaheim Hills home and found Shayona Dhanak’s mother, Leela, bludgeoned and unconscious in a neighbor’s yard. The next morning, the bodies of Shayona Dhanak’s father, Jayprakash, and her 20-year-old sister, Karishma, were discovered in an Irvine park. The victims had been strangled, bludgeoned, burned and stabbed, according to court records.
Murtaza’s cellphone was used near the crime scene an hour or so before the house fire, court records indicate, although Murtaza told authorities he wasn’t in Anaheim Hills that night. He was arrested a few days later at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport while carrying a ticket to Bangladesh. He said he was going to visit his ailing grandmother; authorities said it was a one-way ticket.
Krasnoperov, meanwhile, told friends that during the crime rampage in Anaheim Hills, he was at home recovering from a May 12 accident that totaled his motorcycle. He was en route to a beach party when a vehicle cut him off in Culver City, Zazulevskaya said. He slammed on the brakes, was tossed from the bike and broke his right wrist in three places, she said. Culver City police have confirmed that the accident occurred, but would not release details.
After the slayings, investigators interviewed Krasnoperov and other people who worked with Murtaza. They also searched Krasnoperov’s apartment, taking his computer and identification cards, Zazulevskaya said.
When Krasnoperov visited a female friend in Arizona in June, he took a Greyhound bus “because he did not want to drive for eight hours with a broken arm” and no license, Zazulevskaya said. He had been to Arizona several times during the last six months, she said, although Arizona court records said Krasnoperov might have “fled California to avoid prosecution.”
Investigators told Krasnoperov that taking the trip was OK, according to Zazulevskaya and Maria Tourtchaninova, the Arizona State University student he visited. But on June 14, authorities arrested him at a Mesa, Ariz., home where Tourtchaninova’s family lives.
When Zazulevskaya talked to Krasnoperov in Orange County Jail recently, he calmed her down when she began to cry. “He wants to put on a brave face for his mom, for all of his friends,” she said.
Krasnoperov’s mother visits him every weekend and regularly writes him letters. At a court appearance several weeks ago, she called out to reporters in the hallway: “Innocent. My son is innocent, you will see.”

Latest(June 20th)
Police arrest a man in Chandler, Ariz., in connection with deaths of Anaheim Hills father and daughter.A West Hollywood man arrested in Arizona in connection with a brutal attack on an Anaheim Hills family has waived his rights to an extradition hearing and will return to Orange County within the week, authorities said Wednesday.
Vitaliy Krasnoperov, 21, is described as “a person of interest and is now suspected of being involved” in the killings of Jayprakash Dhanak, 56, and his daughter, Karishma, 20, as well as the beating of Jayprakash’s wife, Leela Dhanak, 53, last month, Anaheim police Sgt. Rick Martinez said.
An acquaintance said Krasnoperov is a “good friend” of the first suspect arrested in connection with the attacks: Iftekhar Murtaza, a 22-year-old Van Nuys man who was detained in Phoenix on May 26 and subsequently charged with two counts of murder and one count of attempted murder in the case.
“He’s just one of his really good friends,” said Melissa Hossain, a 21-year-old fashion design student who says she has known Murtaza for three years. “They dressed alike. They both had the same kind of hairstyle. He (Krasnoperov) was like a white version of Iftekhar.
“They ended up being really close. They would party all the time together.”
Krasnoperov’s facebook.com social networking site is also linked to that of Karishma Dhanak.
Police confirmed that Krasnoperov knows Murtaza, who is in an Orange County jail.
The attacks took place around 11 p.m. May 21 at the Dhanak family’s Anaheim Hills home.
About five hours later, the bodies of Jayprakash and Karishma Dhanak were found near an Irvine bicycle trail.
Leela Dhanak, who survived the attack, is slowly recuperating in a secure location but is not able to speak, Martinez said.
Krasnoperov was arrested at 3 p.m. last Thursday in Mesa, Ariz., and was charged with being a fugitive from justice. On Friday, Krasnoperov waived his right to an extradition hearing, authorities said.
Anaheim detectives had interviewed Krasnoperov after the killings - but new information and word that he was in Arizona prompted authorities to arrest him.
Krasnoperov identified himself as the “person who was wanted” at the time of his arrest, according to Maricopa County, Ariz., Superior Court documents.
The documents also say “the defendant possibly fled California to avoid prosecution,” and “the defendant will flee due to nature of case.”
He is being held at the Maricopa County Jail while he waits to be extradited to Orange County.
Krasnoperov’s arrest was not immediately made public because detectives worried it might compromise the investigation, Martinez said.
Martinez would not comment on suspicions that Krasnoperov might have been involved in the crimes against the Dhanaks, citing the investigation.
“We are not discounting that there may be more people involved,” Martinez said.
No one answered the door at the address that court documents list as Krasnoperov’s address: a beige three-story apartment complex one block from the Whisky a Go Go nightclub on the bustling Sunset Strip in West Hollywood.
Krasnoperov has lived with his mother in West Hollywood for eight years, according to court documents.
Court documents link a Tatyana Krasnoperova to the same address, as well as to YLS Limousine Service.
Roberta Soffa, a neighbor in the same apartment complex where Krasnoperov reportedly lived, said “nice Russian people” live in the apartment. She said she has seen a woman, man and their son, but she only sees them occasionally. She said the man drives a cab.
Hossain, who said she met Krasnoperov only once at Murtaza’s apartment, described him as a “nice, well-dressed, upper-class white guy. The way he talked he seemed normal, not too stuck-up.”
He was also well groomed - “Abercrombie & Fitch-style,” according to Hossain - and claimed to be well connected.
“We were talking about some clubs in Hollywood, and he said, ‘Don’t worry. I’ll get you in wherever you want,’ ” Hossain said.
Hossain said she had visited with Murtaza’s family. She said they were “so upset. His mom is amazed - she’s been crying every day. It’s so horrible.”
Latest (June 14th)
See Charge Against Iftekhar Murtaza
Iftekhar Murtaza’s girlfriend, a UC Irvine freshman he had wooed with roses and charm and talked about marrying, recently ended their three-year romance. Her devoutly Hindu parents apparently frowned on her dating a Muslim, and her older sister had backed their decision.

If prosecutors are right, the young couple’s relationship then took a Shakespearean turn.
Murtaza, 22, of Van Nuys, was charged Wednesday in connection with the slayings of his former girlfriend’s father and sister and the severe beating of her mother at the family’s Anaheim Hills home. He faces two counts of murder and one of attempted murder, and special-circumstance allegations of murder during a kidnapping and committing multiple murders.
If convicted, Murtaza — whose only known brushes with the law had been speeding tickets — could face the death penalty or life in prison without parole.
He is being held at Orange County Jail without bail, and police said they were looking for at least one other suspect.
Murtaza’s arraignment was continued to July 6 during a minutes-long hearing Wednesday afternoon at North Justice Center in Fullerton.
In a light blue jumpsuit with his hair mussed, Murtaza stared ahead, uncuffed hands at his side, and steadily answered the judge’s questions.
He whispered to his public defender and occasionally scratched his face.
The defense attorney, Bryan Harris, declined to comment.
Murtaza’s attorney in Arizona, where U.S. marshals arrested him last month on a fugitive warrant, had told reporters that Murtaza was “innocent of any crime” and that the warrant used to arrest him was “full of inaccuracies.”
Murtaza, the warrant said, was livid at the parents and sister of Shayona Dhanak, 18, because they had pushed her to end their relationship “due to different religious backgrounds, Hindu and Muslim.”
Phone records showed that Murtaza’s cellphone had been used near a crime scene an hour or so before the slayings, the warrant said, although Murtaza had told authorities he wasn’t in Anaheim on that date — May 21.
Late that night, authorities found Dhanak’s mother, Leela, 53, in a neighbor’s yard, bludgeoned and unconscious. The family home in Anaheim Hills was set on fire.
Neighbors reported seeing a young, slender man dragging her outside just before smoke started pouring from the house.
Several hours later, authorities responding to a brush fire near Concordia University and UC Irvine discovered the bodies of her husband, Jayprakash, 56, and her 20-year-old daughter, Karishma.
The victims had been strangled, bludgeoned, burned and stabbed, according to court records. Shayona Dhanak was at UC Irvine and was unharmed. She and her mother — whom investigators as of Wednesday afternoon had been unable to interview because she was so severely beaten — are under police protection.
Muscled and dark-eyed, his upper arms swathed in tattoos, Murtaza was enamored of motorcycles, flashy cars and going to the gym.
He wrote on his Facebook.com page that friends could call him “Ian,” though many called him “Iffy.” His introduction is rambling:
“I do not like the fact that i always say bless you everytime i hear someone sneeze but no one ever says it to me even if i am in a crowded room…. I like a corny sense of humor and a good laugh…. I know that the only truly fair and equitable solution to any dispute is: Rock, Paper, Scissors….”
Among his favorite quotes: “Dont Judge a Book By its Cover.”
Murtaza moved between his parents’ North Hills condominium and various apartments in the San Fernando Valley and dabbled in business economics courses at a community college. He eventually landed a job at a neighborhood loan company, said Melissa Hossain, a 21-year-old fashion design student who said she had known Murtaza about three years.
After a falling out with the owners, Murtaza opened his own mortgage company in Van Nuys, Pacific Wholesale Lending Inc. He told friends it was doing well: He had moved from a small office to a larger one, bought a car and for a time lived in a “really nice, really expensive, Beverly Hills-type” apartment, Hossain said. He also began talking about marriage.
Murtaza had fallen for Shayona Dhanak at a party about three years ago, friends said. A pretty, outgoing teenager, she attended Troy High School in Fullerton, according to her Facebook page, which lists an array of fancies: “deep discussions”; singing in the shower; the colors turquoise and magenta; Disneyland; Harry Potter; and “cheesy music that I can secretly dance to in my room when no one is watching.”
Murtaza wooed her with gusto, friends said. Two or three times a week, he drove to Orange County — almost a 90-mile round trip. Murtaza had gone out with other girls — and many girls seemed to like him — but, Hossain said, “Shayona was the one he actually said ‘I love you’ to.”
In the last year, their relationship appeared to deepen, friends said, though their religious differences made both sets of parents flinch. His family decided not to intervene, Hossain said. Hers said it must end.
A few weeks before the slayings, “She just told him, ‘I just can’t be with you because you’re Muslim and my parents won’t accept it,’ ” Hossain said. “He was upset about it, but it didn’t seem like the end of the world.” The pair had repeatedly split and reunited, and “you just knew they’d get back together,” she said.
In the crime spree’s aftermath, investigators interviewed Murtaza. He told them he and his mother would be leaving to visit his ailing grandmother in Bangladesh, according to his Arizona attorney, Jeremy Phillips.
Soon after, Murtaza was arrested at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. Investigators said his ticket was one-way; his attorney said it was round-trip.
He was returned to California on Monday.
His friends have posted a flurry of supportive messages online:
“for what it’s worth i dont think u did it. hope u get out soon and the cops start looking for the real killers….”
“i know you didnt do it, you couldn’t even hurt a fly let alone a crime like this.”
Dhanak, meanwhile, added a posting to a Facebook page set up as a memorial for her sister, an honors student at Orange Coast College who worked as a makeup artist:
“karishma, my beautiful sister, my role model, my inspiration, my hope, my dreams, my past present and future, my shining star. I will love you always …”

Latest (June 13th)
“Muslim man charged with murder in deaths of Hindu ex-girlfriend’s father, sister“
Iftekhar Murtaza of Van Nuys, who had told friends he planned to marry his girlfriend, 18-year-old Shayona Dhanak, faces two counts of murder and one of attempted murder, and two special circumstance allegations of murder during a kidnapping and one of committing multiple murders.
If convicted, Murtaza could face the death penalty or life in prison without parole.
Murtaza’s arraignment is scheduled for this afternoon at the North Justice Center in Fullerton. He is being held without bail in Anaheim city jail.
Murtaza and Dhanak, who had met at a party and dated for about three years, had repeatedly broken up and reunited — with the latest fallout coming a few weeks before the string of crimes.

UPDATED (June 13th)
Murtaza to be charged or releasedIftekhar Murtaza will be charged or released Wednesday in connection with the killings of his former girlfriend’s father and sister and the attempted murder of the girls’ mother, district attorney officials said.
If charges are filed, it would be early Wednesday, with a court appearance likely following in the afternoon, said Susan Schroeder, a spokeswoman for the District Attorney’s Office.
The 22-year-old man from Van Nuys, who was extradited from Arizona on Monday, is being held at the Anaheim Detention Center while police present their case to the District Attorney’s Office. Police have until 4:30 p.m. Wednesday to file charges or Murtaza will be released.
“In a case like this, we maintain contact with the police department and make suggestions on how to develop the case,” Schroeder said.
“I’d be surprised if we release further information at this point,” Schroeder said.
Investigators are confident they have enough evidence for the District Attorney’s Office to charge Murtaza with two counts of murder and one of attempted murder, Anaheim police Sgt. Rick Martinez said.
The search continues for at least one other culprit, police said.
On May 21, firefighters found an Anaheim Hills home torched and a badly beaten Leela Dhanak, 53, lying nearby. Five hours later, the bodies of Jayprakash Dhanak, 56, and Karishma Dhanak, 20, were found near a bike trail in Irvine. Murtaza’s former girlfriend, Shayona, was not at the home at the time and was not injured.
Murtaza, who is Muslim, was angry with the Dhanaks – devout Hindus – for trying to keep him away from Shayona, according to court papers.
UPDATED (June 12th)
(CBS) ANAHEIM, Calif. The ex-boyfriend of a girl whose father and sister were killed and her mother found beaten outside their burning Anaheim Hills home was due back in Orange County Monday, police said.
Iftekhar Murtaza, 22, of Van Nuys, described as a “person of interest” in the case, had a ticket to Bangladesh when he was arrested May 25 at an Arizona airport, authorities said.
Murtaza waived his right to an extradition hearing and agreed to return to Orange County. Prosecutors will have two days to charge him after his return.
Police declined to say when Murtaza was expected to arrive in the Southland.
“We don’t report extraditions typically,” Anaheim police Sgt. Rick Martinez said. “There’s no reason for anyone to know ahead of time. We don’t discuss transportation.”
Attorney Jeremy Philips, who represented Murtaza at his hearing in Arizona, said earlier that Murtaza’s interests would be better served in returning to Orange County.
“Rather than have him sit for 90 days in the Maricopa County jail, it’d be much better to get him back in front of a judge in California who is allowed to look at his innocence and say, `There’s no case here. You’re free to go,”‘ Philips said.
A motive for the attacks has not been determined but there have been reports the family tried to break up the relationship between Murtaza and the youngest daughter, Shayona Dhanak, 18, because of religious reasons. He is Muslim and they were Hindu.
Shayona Dhanak was not home the night firefighters were sent to the family’s burning home on May 22. Leela Dhanak, 53, was found beaten in the driveway of a neighbor’s home.
The charred bodies of her husband, Jayprakash Dhanak, 56, and their older daughter, Karishma Dhanak, 20, were found several miles away in Irvine, Martinez said.
Murtaza told investigators he was not in Anaheim when the crimes occurred. Telephone records show that Murtaza’s cell phone was used about 90 minutes before the killings, less than two miles from the Dhanaks’ home, according to the court documents.
Shayona Dhanak remains under police protection, because investigators believe more than one person was involved in the crime, Martinez said.
Martinez said earlier that police also were trying to determine if the slayings are related to other issues, including the past criminal record of Jayprakash Dhanak. He had served a prison sentence for bilking the U.S. Postal Service out of some $7.9 million through a direct-mail company he and his wife operated. Leela Dhanak was named in an indictment but the charges were dropped when he pleaded guilty.
Murtaza, who worked at a loan company, had dated the daughter for about three years.
Source: 2007 CBS Broadcasting Inc.
More News About Iftekhar Murtaza
More news: Man suspected in OC double slaying extradited to California
More news about Murtaza from L.A.Times
UPDATED (June 5th)
Investigators said they were continuing to look into whether Jay Dhanak’s past was linked to the slayings. In 2002, he pleaded guilty to bilking the U.S. Postal Service out of millions of dollars as the operations manager for a direct-mail company. He was sentenced to 27 months in federal prison.
Authorities interviewed Murtaza last week, and shortly afterward he left for Arizona. Over the weekend, authorities feared he was fleeing the country and filed an arrest warrant in Orange County that has been sealed.
Phillips, Murtaza’s attorney, said his client alerted police May 24 that he had bought a round-trip ticket to visit Bangladesh with his mother and would return in July. The fugitive warrant used to arrest Murtaza said he was carrying a one-way ticket.
The next day, Phillips said, Murtaza was with his older brother at Sky Harbor airport when marshals “grabbed him and said, ‘We need to see your papers’ ” and confiscated his belongings.
Murtaza’s brother assumed that his sibling had mistakenly wound up on a terrorism watch list, the attorney said. When the brothers realized the arrest was linked to the Dhanak slayings, it was “a shot out of the blue.”
The fugitive warrant, which has thus far provided the most details regarding the crime spree, is “full of inaccuracies,” Phillips said, and relies heavily on Murtaza’s phone being used near one of the crime scenes.
Anaheim police “have been aggressively unhelpful in providing any information about what underpins their suspicions,” he said.
Citing the ongoing investigation, Anaheim Police Sgt. Rick Martinez declined to comment on the attorney’s version of events. “Our goal right now is to solve this case and find the truth in what happened,” he said.
During Thursday’s hearing in Maricopa County Superior Court, Murtaza sat separate from other prisoners. The large tribal-style tattoos on his arms peeked out of his faded black-and-white-striped jail clothes. Murtaza fidgeted with the shackles around his ankles and sometimes whispered to Phillips.
No family members appeared in court; they’re “very traumatized,” Phillips said.
Phillips initially fought Murtaza’s extradition, noting that no charges or indictment had been filed against him in California.
Maricopa County Superior Court Commissioner Eartha K. Washington replied that because a California judge had signed off on an arrest warrant for Murtaza, it didn’t matter.
After consulting with his attorney and an Orange County deputy public defender who unexpectedly appeared in court, Murtaza agreed to voluntarily return to California. The defender, Dolores Yost, declined to say why she was there.
Phillips said it would be more productive to move Murtaza to California, where he could challenge the allegations, than for him to remain in custody in Phoenix and fight extradition efforts. Authorities were expected to take Murtaza to California within a few days, Maricopa County sheriff’s deputies said.
Murtaza’s previous dealings with law enforcement involved speeding tickets, Phillips said, and he’s now being housed with maximum-security prisoners.
“He is terrified,” Phillips said.
Posted (June 4th)
Love story and tragedy
Acquaintances of Murtaza, Dhanak describe affair reminiscent of ‘Romeo and Juliet.
By TONY SAAVEDRA, KIMBERLY EDDS and GWENDOLYN DRISCOLLThe Orange County Register
Iftekhar Murtaza fancied himself a bit of the rebel, a gym rat with red and black tribal tattoos on buff shoulders.
In photos posted online, he struck a “gangsta” pose – muscles rippling outside a sleeveless T-shirt.
But those who know him considered Murtaza more of a “wanksta,” a harmless wannabe gangster who used punctuation marks to make smiley faces online.
Now some are not sure what to believe.
Murtaza – who had never been to court as an adult for anything more serious than a speeding ticket – appeared before an Arizona judge Thursday as a “person of interest” in the slaying of his on-again-off-again girlfriend’s father and sister in Orange County. His former girlfriend’s mother also was beaten and left outside the family’s Anaheim Hills home. The homicide victims – Jayprakesh and Karishma Dhanak – were beaten with baseball bats, stabbed and set ablaze on a hiking trail in Irvine, two minutes from the UCI dorm where Murtaza’s ex-girlfriend, Shayona, lived, police and court records say. Although authorities were not describing the 22-year-old as a suspect Thursday, they also weren’t letting him out of jail. Murtaza was carrying a plane ticket to Bangladesh when federal marshals arrested him last weekend at a Phoenix airport.
A portrait emerged Thursday from close friends, school records and Murtaza’s Friendster page of a man whose deep feelings belied his bad boy facade.
Hours after the murders, Murtaza planned to pick up longtime friend Anisha Vasani and another close friend from Westwood and drive to the Santa Ana hospital where Shayona Dhanak’s mother lay unconscious. He and Dhanak had broken up a few weeks before – as they had many times in their three-year relationship – but Murtaza didn’t think twice about rushing to her, Vasani said.
“He wanted to be with Shayona, for her,” said Vasani, a psychology major at UCLA. “He just loved her so much.” But the trip was called off. Police weren’t letting anyone into the hospital room. Shayona Dhanak was under police protection.
On his Web page, Murtaza described himself as “someone who knows how to have fun but takes life seriously when it’s needed.”
At 6-foot-1, 171 pounds, Murtaza, a Leo, urged readers on his site to let the kid inside them “come out and play.” A former student of John F. Kennedy High in Granada Hills and Albert Einstein Continuation School in North Hills, Murtaza took a few junior college classes ending in 2005. He was a smart guy, friends said, who managed to make a good living without a formal education, paying for a glitzy Hollywood Hills apartment and a Range Rover. But his lack of enthusiasm for education concerned his girlfriend’s parents. Over the years, Murtaza shared the highs and lows of his love life in dozens of e-mails to Richa Singh, a Tucson woman he met about five years ago in Los Angeles.
His once-joyful missives turned heartsick as he became convinced that the Dhanak familiy was sabotaging his relationship with Shayona, 18. “He felt kind of hopeless with the whole situation,” said Singh, 23. “He told me he wanted to talk to the family and reassure them. He felt the whole family was ganged up on him.”
Religion was part of the problem, court records said. The Dhanaks are Hindu, Murtaza is Muslim. Pressured by her family, Shayona broke off the relationship over and over again – but always managed to find her way back to Murtaza – and he would always take her back, Vasani said.
“Oh, my God, she is so mad at me,” Singh remembers Murtaza e-mailing her during one of his spats with Shayona. But he never threatened any violence, friends said.
“Most Hindu families will give in after a while if they see the person really loves them,” Vasani said. “He understood that with time that would happen. Everything with Shayona happened with time.”
Shayona last split with Murtaza about a month ago, friends said, but no one expected it to last long.
“I could see the pain in his eyes,” Vasani said. “But he was still smiling. He knew they would get back together.”
Singh said Murtaza met Shayona at a party about three years ago and was instantly enamored.
“I met this girl. She is awesome,” Murtaza e-mailed Singh.
But Dhanak knew her family would not approve of the tattooed Muslim man, Vasani said – and resisted his advances – for a while. He gave her a ring – rented a helicopter – and worshiped the ground she walked on. He overheard phone calls Dhanak had with her mother, disapproving of the relationship, but still he told friends he wanted to marry Dhanak – and that he planned to talk to her parents about it.
That’s why friends they have a hard time seeing him as a killer, especially one capable of the ferocity shown in the Dhanak attack.
“He never said anything bad about her family,” Vasani said. “He respected them. For him, it was all about love.”
Indeed, Murtaza challenged people on his Web site to become his friends.
“Anyone who wants to meet me, I wanna meet you, and anyone who I wanna meet, you should definitely want to meet me, too.”
Contact the writer: Register staff writers Denisse Salazar, Sonya Smith and Sarah Tully contributed to this report.

Rampage against Anaheim family tied to breakup?
Hindu parents of a UC Irvine student disliked her boyfriend being Muslim. The parents and another daughter were brutally attacked.
By Ashley Powers and Dave McKibben, Times Staff Writers May 31, 2007

Suspect
She was a college freshman whose Hindu family didn’t believe in dating before marriage. He was a Muslim, which troubled her parents, and they convinced her that he wasn’t the one.
Their breakup, investigators said, might have played a role in a string of vicious crimes that unfolded in Orange County last week: Her Anaheim Hills home was set ablaze, her mother savagely beaten and her father and sister killed. The victims had been strangled, bludgeoned, burned and stabbed, according to court records.
The young man, Iftekhar Murtaza, 22, of Van Nuys, was arrested last weekend at the Phoenix airport in connection with the slayings. He had left Southern California after investigators questioned him and was carrying a one-way ticket to Bangladesh.
Phone records indicated that Murtaza’s cellphone had been used less than two miles from one of the crime scenes an hour or so before the killings. He told authorities he was not in Anaheim that day, court documents said.
Even with the arrest, much about the sequence of the brutal acts — with two crime scenes, three victims and varying witness accounts of what happened over a five-hour span — remains a mystery.
Murtaza, described by authorities as a “person of interest” and considered a flight risk, is being held in Phoenix, with an extradition hearing to return him to California scheduled for this morning. No charges have been filed against him, and police said they are looking for multiple suspects. His attorney did not return phone calls seeking comment.
A few weeks before the slayings, Murtaza and his girlfriend, Shayona Dhanak, an 18-year-old UC Irvine student, had broken up after three years. It was unclear how the pair met and how they had dated for so long despite her family’s disapproval.
Murtaza had stayed off and on at a condominium on Langdon Avenue in North Hills, where his parents most recently lived. He worked at a loan company, said a woman affiliated with the Langdon Village homeowners association.
His penchant for blowing through stop signs in flashy cars — first a Mustang convertible, lately a Range Rover — annoyed neighbors, said the woman, who declined to give her name. Murtaza has been ticketed for speeding in Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties.
Murtaza’s family sold the condo about a month ago and had purchased real estate in Gilbert, Ariz., property records show. His father, however, still works at a convenience store in Van Nuys called Discount Cigarette. He declined to comment Wednesday.
“I strongly believe that he has no part in it,” said Ishtiak Murtaza, one of Iftekhar Murtaza’s older brothers, according to the Associated Press.
Shayona Dhanak, said several friends, often brought Murtaza to movies, the mall and miniature golf with her girlfriends. He “was a goofy guy. He was a happy-type person,” said one 20-year-old UC Irvine student who asked not to be identified.
He “was a caring guy and a good friend,” said another young woman. “I never saw any tension of any kind. He was really friendly. We would all just hang out. I never could have imagined anything like this.”
The Dhanaks and their elder daughter, Karishma, an Orange Coast College student who dreamed of becoming a makeup artist, apparently pushed for Shayona Dhanak to end the relationship “due to different religious backgrounds, Hindu and Muslim,” court documents said.
Leela Dhanak, 53, and her husband, Jayprakash, 56, had emigrated from India to California, where the couple worked their way up from low-level mail sorting jobs, said neighbors and their former attorneys. They had lived in a two-story Anaheim Hills home for about a decade.
Neighbors described them as polite and unobtrusive, though Jayprakash “Jay” Dhanak had a criminal record. In 2002, he pleaded guilty to bilking the U.S. Postal Service as the operations manager for a direct-mail company and was sentenced to 27 months in federal prison.
The case represented about $7.9 million in losses, postal inspectors said. Charges against Leela Dhanak were dropped.
Investigators are continuing to look into whether Jay Dhanak’s past is linked to the slayings.
Leela and Jay Dhanak were active in their Whittier temple, where she taught religion classes and which they represented at Hindu conventions. The temple advocated a rigorous style of Hinduism “as a way of preserving culture and protecting their children from what they perceive to be the evils of Western society,” according to a Times article about the temple.
Strict adherents forgo television, drugs, meat, alcohol and dating before marriage. Men and women are separated during worship. Women may not hold leadership positions or speak to the saints or the swami, tenets uncommon to other Hindu sects, the article said.
The temple “was saddened to learn of the tragic events surrounding the Dhanak family…. However, with the strength of our collective faith and the blessings of God, we are sure that we will overcome this period,” read a spokesman’s statement after the crimes were publicized.
Authorities arriving at a late-night blaze at the Dhanaks’ home on May 21 discovered Leela Dhanak bludgeoned and unconscious on a neighbor’s lawn. Neighbors reported seeing a young, slender man dragging Leela Dhanak out of her home just before smoke started pouring from the back of the house and a vehicle sped away.
Just after 4 a.m. May 22, Irvine authorities responded to reports of smoke coming from William R. Mason Regional Park, near Concordia University and UC Irvine, about 20 miles from the home.
At the origin of a quickly doused brush fire were the badly burned bodies of Jay and Karishma Dhanak. She was identified through fingerprints that day and her father through dental records later that week.
Leela Dhanak, and her daughter — who did not live with her family and was unharmed — were placed under police protection.
Authorities interviewed Murtaza last week, and shortly afterward he left for Arizona, said a source close to the investigation who was not authorized to speak publicly about the case. Court records indicated that a victim had alerted officers to Murtaza’s possible involvement.
Over the weekend, authorities filed an arrest warrant in Orange County, which has been sealed, the source said. Anaheim police told U.S. marshals Friday that Murtaza was flying into Sky Harbor International Airport from LAX on the first leg of a trip to Bangladesh, said Arizona District U.S. Marshal David Gonzalez.
Four deputy U.S. marshals stopped Murtaza in a terminal that night and confirmed his identity with his passport and ID. “It was very uneventful,” Gonzalez said.

Family defends man held in double murder
Former boyfriend of surviving daughter arrested in Phoenix airport carrying a one-way ticket to Bangladesh.
By GWENDOLYN DRISCOLL and DENISSE SALAZAR
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTERThe family of a Van Nuys man who has been arrested at a Phoenix airport in connection with the deaths of an Anaheim Hills father and daughter, the beating of a mother and a house fire last week say they are “very sad” about what is happening.
Iftekhar Murtaza, 22, was carrying a one-way ticket to Bangladesh when he was arrested, Maricopa County Superior Court officials confirmed Tuesday. He will have an extradition hearing at 8 a.m. today at Maricopa County Superior Court, officials said.
If Murtaza waives his right to a hearing, “he’ll go as soon as the people from your state make arrangements,” said J.W. Brown, a spokesperson for the court.
If he does not waive his right, the court will schedule another hearing in 30 days. After 90 days, the governor of Arizona can issue an order for extradition, Brown said.
On Wednesday morning Ishtiak Murtaza, 37, the brother of Iftekhar Murtaza, said the arrest had created a “situation under pressure for my family.”
Iftekhar Murtaza is identified in court papers as the ex-boyfriend of Shayona Dhanak, the 18-year-old daughter of one of the two homicide victims, Jayprakash Dhanak, 56. The other victim, Karishma Dhanak, 20, was Shayona Dhanak’s sister. Jayprakash Dhanak’s wife, Leela Dhanak, 53, was severely beaten in the attack but survived.
“I strongly believe that he has no part in it,” Ishtiak Murtaza said at the family’s convenience store in Van Nuys.
Iftekhar Murtaza’s 64-year-old father declined to comment Wednesday morning as he helped customers at his Discount Cigarette Bargain Line Grocery store in a shopping center at the corner of Sepulveda and Victory boulevards.
“He is under pressure and is very sad,” said Ishtiak Murtaza about his father. His mother, Begum, who usually works at the store, was absent Wednesday morning.
When asked about his brother’s occupation, past relationships and character, Ishtiak Murtaza declined to comment.
Iftekhar Murtaza lived with his parents and his brother in a second-level apartment in a quiet complex in the 6600 block of Haskell Avenue in Van Nuys.
Neighbors in the complex said the family members kept to themselves.
“They are quiet and don’t cause trouble,” said Champaigne Macier, 30, who has lived in the building for a year. Murtaza’s relatives bought a home in Gilbert, Ariz., in September 2006. The house has been rented for one month to tenants who said they had little contact with the Murtazas except to receive an occasional piece of mail. Anaheim police declined to comment Wednesday, citing a lack of new information.
After his arrest, Murtaza gave a voluntary statement in which he said he was “not in Anaheim on the day or evening of the homicide,” according to the court papers. He has declined a request for an interview at Maricopa County Jail. Wednesday morning, his lawyer, Jeremy L. Phillips said, “I don’t have anything to say.” Murtaza was arraigned about 5 p.m. Saturday and charged with being a fugitive from justice. He is being held without bond by the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Department.