Bangladeshi nurse 'missing' in New York

Dhaka: A Bangladeshi nurse has been reportedly missing in New York for over three months, a media report said on Thursday.

Mahfuza Rahman, 30, was last seen at her workplace, the Bellevue Hospital, on December 8, 2015, bdnews24 reported.

The next day her husband Mohammad Chowdhury, 38, informed the hospital authorities, when they called to inquire about her, that she had returned to Bangladesh because a close relative was injured in an accident. He also said his wife would return to New York by the first week of March 2016.

However, Mahfuza did not return and Chowdhury, meanwhile, left the house with their 9-year-old daughter, telling the neighbours that they were returning to Dhaka.

Last week, Bellevue Hospital authorities informed local police who then went to the couple's Kingsbridge Heights home in Bronx.

The neighbours told police that the house had been locked since Chowdhury "left for Bangladesh" with his daughter on December 15, 2015. Before leaving, he had requested the neighbours to keep an eye on the house.

Fearing that Mahfuza might have been killed, police on Monday searched the family's home on East 198th Street, dug up the patio and had a cadaver dog search for any scent. Police now have sought permission from a local court to inquire about Rahman's bank accounts.

The couple's friend Mohammad N. Majumder, a Bangldeshi lawyer living in Bronx, said they too were trying to track the couple.

"We are trying to establish contact with their relatives in Bangladesh as well," he said.