January 12, 2009	Monday	Muharram 14, 1430

KARACHI, Jan 11: The suspended SHO of the Anti-Car Lifting Cell, booked along with his three subordinates for the murder of four Dubai-based traders in an alleged encounter, surrendered himself to the police on Sunday, the police said.

The ACLC SHO, Inspector Malik Irshad, and his team had killed Haji Mohammad Tahir Achakzai, Obaidullah Khan Tareen, Mohammad Ibrahim Achakzai, and Zainuddin Khan Achakzai a little after midnight on Dec 31 at Khalid bin Walid Road.

The SP investigation (south), Niaz Ahmed Khoso, told Dawn that suspect Inspector Malik Irshad was arrested on Sunday in the case after he himself appeared before the investigation officer. “A constable wanted in the case had been arrested on Saturday,” he added.

A murder case under Sections 302 and 34 of the Pakistan Penal Code was registered against the ACLC team on the complaint of Haji Lala Khan, the father of one of the four victims, Zainuddin, only after the Supreme Court took a suo moto notice and ordered the police to book the suspects in a murder case.

Earlier, the Ferozabad police had registered a case under Section 319 (Qatl-i-Khata or unintentional murder) against the police officials after an inquiry into the killing of the four traders from Balochistan concluded that the incident was the outcome of criminal negligence of the police party.

A person involved in a murder case could be punished with death while maximum sentence given under Section 319 is up to five years, in addition to diyat.

However, on Jan 9, a two-member bench of the apex court comprising Chief Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar and Justice Ijaz-ul-Hassan had ordered the Karachi police to register a murder case under Section 302 of the Pakistan Penal Code against the ACLC officials.

The bench also criticised the Karachi police for nominating the accused policemen in a case under Section 319 (Qatl-i-Khata) of the PPC instead of lodging an FIR against them under Section 302 (intentional murder or Qatl-i-Amd) of the PPC.

SP Khoso said that efforts were being made to track down the two other suspects booked in the FIR. “Several raids have been conducted to trace them, but no clue to their whereabouts has so far been found,” he added.

He said that the police would produce the two arrested suspects before the judicial magistrate concerned for obtaining their 14-day police remand.

Meanwhile, sources said that the arrested constable, Zafar, was named in the FIR by the complainant. However, they said that the arrested constable was the namesake of the suspect named in the FIR.

The ACLC team had opened fire on the four traders’ car with automatic weapons near Tawakkal Motors on Khalid bin Walid Road at around 12.40am on Dec 31. Two occupants of the car were killed instantly and two others, who were fatally wounded, died at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre.

According to the hospital sources, three of the four victims received four bullets each and the fourth one was shot thrice.

The ACLC team claimed that the occupants of the car had fired on them and they returned fire in self-defence.

In fact, the sources said, the ACLC men had opened fire on the car by mistake when they and a team of the Boat Basin police were looking for a black Corolla of the latest model hijacked near the Bilawal roundabout in Clifton an hour before the shooting.

They said the victims, one of whom was related to Tawakkal Motors’ owner, sped the car to reach the showroom on Khalid bin Walid Road, where the alleged shoot-out took place.