Hyderabad: Several cases against gangster Ayub Khan, arrested from Mumbai airport following an Interpol alert this week, had fallen flat in courts in the past. Witnesses had been terrorised by his gang and petitioners faced strongarm tactics and turned hostile during the trials. Ayub had threatened to kill many witnesses, say police officials.

“Soon after he came out on bail in the Advocate Mannan Ghori murder case, he started hunting down witnesses. Even policemen were scared of arresting the gangster as, when challenged, he had a habit of attacking them with deadly weapons. He had with him three passports in different names. With the help of insiders from police department, he had been using them to evade the eye of enforcement agencies and fly out.

“No witness or complainant dared to depose against him. This was one reason why most of the cases ended up in acquittal. Witnesses often turned hostile, to escape his brutal pressure,” said DCP South Zone V. Sathyanarayana. “In 1992, police tried to nab him, but he attacked them with deadly weapons. Police opened fire. He received a bullet injury on his knee,” the DCP added.

In 2002, Ayub and his four associates armed with knives waylaid Advocate Manna Ghori in a narrow lane at Pacha Mohalla near the Mecca Masjid after the victim refused to pay a rowdy mamool of `2.5lakh in the purchase of a house. The advocate had filed a civil lawsuit against the gangster. Ayub and gang killed him and fled. The gangster was convicted in this case and in another double-murder case. He managed to come out of jail by getting a stay from the high court.

In 1997, Ayub Khan obtained a passport with fake name Naveed Ahmed with a Habeeb Nagar address. He got another passport in the name of Khalid Pasha.