KARACHI, April 18: An anti-terrorism court sentenced on Tuesday three accused to death in the murder and kidnapping for ransom case of a young man, whose body was found in Hyderabad.
Judge Haq Nawaz Baloch of the ATC-5 also ordered the three accused to pay Rs100,000 each to the victim’s family. The prosecution, represented by Mazhar Qayyum, examined 20 prosecution witnesses, including an eye-witness to the murder.
Abdul Asif, Mohammed Atif and Rizwan Khan, all in their early twenties, were prosecuted for kidnapping and murdering Muneebul Haq, 21, a resident of Gulshan-i-Memaar.
Atif, a friend of the victim, kidnapped Muneeb on Oct 10, 2005, with the help of his accomplices and took him to Hyderabad.
The judge sentenced Atif to death under Section 365-A of the Pakistan Penal Code for kidnapping the victim for ransom. The judge also ordered confiscation of Atif’s property worth Rs100,000 for the offence.
The kidnappers contacted the victim’s father, Qazi Mashhudul Haq, a bank manager, from victim’s cellular phone and initially demanded Rs1 million for his release.
The next day, the kidnappers took the young victim to a graveyard in Hyderabad and slaughtered him.
Meanwhile, accused Asif kept on calling victim’s father and agreed to accept Rs200,000 as ransom.
However, the kidnappers did not turn up to receive the money at the designated place.
The judge condemned the three accused to death for the murder of Muneeb. A fine of Rs100,000 each was also imposed on convicts and the judge ordered that the defaulters would have to undergo one-year imprisonment.
The family, which had initially reported the incident on Oct 12 with the Surjani police, learnt about Muneeb’s killing in Hyderabad through newspapers on Oct 17.
Later on Oct 23, the shattered family reported the incident to the police and got an FIR lodged against unknown culprits.
The investigation was assigned to the Anti-violent Crime Cell, which tracked down Asif with the help of record of the victim’s phone. Asif was arrested on Oct 25 in the morning and his two alleged accomplices were arrested in the evening in Hyderabad on a lead given by him. The police also seized the knife used in the killing of the victim, from the graveyard.
PW Mohammad Jawaid, a resident of Karachi, appeared as an eye-witness to the murder of the victim. He submitted before the court that he had gone to Hyderabad for purchasing bangles.
He said that on Oct 11 he went to offer Fateha at a shrine where he saw Atif and Rizwan killing the victim.
He said when the two accused left the graveyard, he went close to the victim and saw him lying in a pool of blood.
The prosecution witness said that later he went to the B Section police station, Latifabad, and gave his statement to ASI Nasir regarding the incident. He said later on Oct 29, he identified the two accused before a judicial magistrate in Karachi.
Mohammed Naeem, a resident of Latifabad, who was a former neighbour of accused Atif, stated that Atif lived in his vicinity for 15 years and later he shifted to Karachi some seven years ago.
The witness said that on Oct 10 accused Atif and Rizwan with their victim came to his house, and left early in the morning.
