BELLEVUE, WASHINGTON: In a horrifying incident that unravels a dark tale of deception and cold-blooded murder, a 30-year-old Indian software development engineer has been arrested in the United States for killing his wife. The arrest comes nearly nine months after the crime took place, following an intense investigation that exposed a secret extramarital affair and a trail of sinister digital evidence.
The accused, Avinash Narne, allegedly strangled his 27-year-old wife, Raajitha Sabbineni, to death at their apartment in Bellevue, Washington, on October 27, 2025. After committing the crime, Narne went to great lengths to stage the scene as an accident before calling the police, claiming his wife was locked inside the bathroom and refusing to respond. When law enforcement officers forced entry into the bathroom, they discovered Sabbineni lying dead on the floor.
The ‘Bitter Smoothie’ and Photo Evidence
While Narne initially claimed he had simply gone out to run errands and returned to find the door locked, the investigation systematically dismantled his alibi. The King County Medical Examiner’s Office officially ruled the death a homicide, citing asphyxia due to strangulation.
​As detectives dug deeper, they uncovered a dark motive. Narne had been involved in a long-term, secret relationship with a woman back in India. Shockingly, the girlfriend had even attended Narne and Sabbineni’s arranged marriage on June 5, 2025. On the very day of the murder, phone records showed Narne called his lover at least four times. In a gruesome twist, he also sent a photograph of his wife’s lifeless body to his girlfriend in India.
Further digital forensics of the victim’s phone revealed a series of alarming text messages Sabbineni had sent to her husband, complaining that drinks he prepared for her tasted strangely bitter. On the day she was murdered, her final texts explicitly mentioned that a smoothie he made for her tasted like “medicine” and “cough syrup.”
Legal Consequences
Avinash Narne was officially charged with first-degree murder on July 5, 2026. He is currently being held in custody on a $5 million bail and faces a potential sentence of life in prison if convicted.
