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The husband of Mamta Kafle Bhatt, a 28-year-old Virginia mother who has been missing for over three weeks, is accused of killing her inside their home and dragging her body outside, court documents obtained by CNN affiliate WJLA show.
Naresh Bhatt faces a felony charge of prohibition against concealment of a body, according to court records, and he was taken away in handcuffs Thursday after authorities conducted a search warrant on the couple’s home. Bhatt was in court Friday morning for arraignment.
He has not been formally charged with murder, but the preliminary criminal complaint obtained by WJLA states that, “on or about July 30, 2024, the accused, Naresh Bhatt, murdered his wife, Mamta Bhatt.”
CNN has reached out to the public defender’s office, which is representing Naresh Bhatt.
“There was evidence in the residence indicating the body was inside the residence and dragged out of the residence,” a handwritten addition to the statement says, signed with what appeared to be the charging law enforcement officer’s initials.
“During the course of this investigation, a substantial amount of digital and forensic evidence consistent with her death was recovered,” the complaint says.
CNN has reached out to the prosecutor’s office for comment on whether Bhatt faces upgraded charges to reflect the murder allegation made by the officer.
During Friday’s arraignment, the judge didn’t change the terms of his bail and Bhatt will continue to be held without it, according to WJLA. Bhatt is scheduled to appear in court for a bond hearing Monday morning, online court records show.
Bhatt is a former US Army Reserve automated logistics specialist who served from June 2017 to February 2024, Army spokeswoman Heather Hagan told CNN Friday. He has no deployments and left the Army in the rank of specialist, she said.
Substantial amount of blood inside couple’s bedroom, investigators say
The Prince William County Office of the Commonwealth’s Attorney revealed details during Friday’s arraignment about what investigators found inside the couple’s home while executing a search warrant.
Investigators say Bhatt made a number of inconsistent statements about his wife’s whereabouts, WJLA reported, and claimed she destroyed her own cell phone before disappearing.
On July 30, investigators say Bhatt was seen at a Walmart buying a pack of three knives, two of which were unaccounted for after the search warrant, according to WJLA. A day later, he was seen at another Walmart location buying cleaning supplies.
After completing their search warrant, investigators found what appeared to be blood pooling and blood splatter in the home’s main bedroom; the bed appeared to be moved, blocking a closet; light pink stains were found on bedroom carpeting after the bed was removed; and pools of blood were found in the bathroom “as if something was dragged across the floor,” along with blood pooling on the shower floor, WJLA reported from Friday’s arraignment.
When investigators removed the bathtub, they saw what they believed to be blood in the caulking of the bathtub, WJLA reported.
A number of the cleaning supplies Bhatt purchased were also found in the home, which appeared to be in disarray, according to law enforcement details revealed at the arraignment, WJLA said.
Additionally, Bhatt sold his Tesla on August 19, and the house appeared to be packed up with a suitcase ready, missing items from hangers and passports available upon entry into the home, WJLA reported.
“We’re all in a state shock,” a former coworker of Kafle Bhatt’s told reporters after Friday’s arraignment. “Again, the details that came out are way more horrifying than what I would have expected.”
How the investigation unfolded
Kafle Bhatt was last seen on July 27 at UVA Health Prince William Medical Center in Manassas, according to police. She worked there as a registered nurse in the medical surgical unit, the center told CNN Friday. On July 28, she spoke with a friend, and on July 31 she was last seen by her husband at the dinner table, he previously told police.
On August 2, police conducted a wellness check at the couple’s home and spoke to her husband, who “provided additional information” and told investigators he didn’t want to report her as missing at the time, police said. Three days later, he reported her missing, authorities said in a news release on August 15.
The wellness check request came from Kafle Bhatt’s work colleagues, CNN affiliate WUSA reported.
“UVA Health is heartbroken to learn the devastating news that Mamta Kafle Bhatt is presumed deceased,” UVA Health Prince William Medical Center spokesperson Eric Swensen told CNN in a statement Friday. “First and foremost, we extend our deepest sympathies and condolences to Mamta’s loved ones, friends and colleagues, and we grieve together with our community and all who knew Mamta.”
“UVA Health has been cooperating with the police investigation from the outset, and we will continue to work with police investigators to aid them however possible in their efforts,” the statement continued.
Detectives conducted an exhaustive investigation from August 5-8, they said, and found there was significant lack of recent contact between Kafle Bhatt and her family, friends, employer and on social media, so they elevated her missing status to involuntary/critical missing person status.
For weeks, community members, colleagues and friends searched for Kafle Bhatt, looking for morsels of information about her whereabouts as they shared every update on Facebook group pages and GoFundMe accounts organized by friends.
Investigators executed 10 search warrants and conducted “hundreds of interviews related to to this case,” Manassas Park Police Chief Mario Lugo said Wednesday evening as a search warrant on the Bhatt residence was underway.
When asked Wednesday if there was a “person of interest” in Kafle Bhatt’s disappearance, Lugo said her husband has “been a point of interest and everybody knows that,” adding that he has not been cooperative with police, a departure from the department’s initial release on August 15, where they said “the husband, friends and co-workers have all been cooperative throughout the investigation and detectives will continue to follow up on all investigative leads to locate Mamta Kafle.”
In an interview with WUSA last week, Bhatt said he was worried about where his wife may be and that this wasn’t the first time she had gone missing.
“I’m the one who is suffering,” he told WUSA. “She is my baby’s mom. She is my wife. I’m the one suffering, so I don’t know what I’m supposed to say.”
The couple’s infant was taken from the home under a yellow blanket, video from Thursday shows, and police say she’s being looked after by a caregiver approved by the Department of Social Services.
Kafle Bhatt’s family, who live in Nepal, obtained a visa and are in the process of the traveling to the US to try and get emergency custody of the baby, Bandita Sharma Dhal, an immigration attorney working with the family, told CNN Friday.
This story has been updated with additional information.
CNN’s Haley Britzky and Nic Anderson contributed to this report.