PESHAWAR, June 11: One major impediment to improve conviction rate and control crimes is the faulty police investigation system in which medico legal officers are attached little significance, according to legal and security experts.
As per experts’ accounts, medico legal officers are essential to justice system as their findings/reports provide basis for investigations into criminal cases, but they work in total reliance on police instead of conducting their official duty with independence and free of external pressures.
“Investigation is carried out on scientific lines in the modern world, but here FA passed police investigators (at the lower level) perform the job,” a medical practitioner associated with the department of forensic medicine and toxicology, Khyber Medical College, told Dawn when contacted.
He said the nature of crimes had changed with more street crimes taking place, but the investigation techniques had not changed.
“Now without applying forensic approach, cases cannot be solved and investigation methodology has attained great significance in today’s world,” said the doctor, adding “in the developed countries postmortem (of a murder case victim) starts from the crime scene and if the crime scene is washed 30 per cent evidence remains and the remaining vanishes.” He was referring to the general practice in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and elsewhere in Pakistan as crime scene is washed without conducting detailed investigations to collect evidence.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has around 10 per cent conviction rate, as per official figures recently released to the media. A few years ago, the province had a conviction rate of only 3 per cent.
A senior police officer said MLOs’ findings set the course for investigations and carried far reaching impact for the court’s decision in a murder case of any other criminal cases, but that was not case here as MLO’s was the least utilized office in holding effective investigations in criminal cases.
The court, said the officer, attached weightage to an MLO’s findings if he reported homicide or suicide as the cause of death in his report identifying the cause of death in murder cases.
However, the situation, said Noor Alam Khan, a senior advocate with expertise in criminology, was far from being ideal. He said, in reality, MLOs prepared the death certificate of victim(s) in murder cases purely on the basis of information provided by police and not on the basis of their independent findings.
“Ideally, MLOs should visit the crime scene to compile an independent report, but this is not in practice here,” said Mr. Khan.
His comment was echoed when a forensic medicine expert, requesting anonymity, said that without knowing circumstantial evidence how could a doctor determine whether the death was accidental, suicidal, or a homicidal?.
He said that as per a general practice in the developed countries police cordoned off a crime scene immediately after the occurrence of a crime. In many instances, according to the doctor, a crime scene officer collects evidence from the scene and a forensic pathologist comes in after which a doctor comes in to examine the victim of shooting/murder case.
“No one can remove the body from the crime scene unless a doctor comes in and does his part of the initial investigations, but here anybody can remove the body and take it to a hospital,” said the doctor. That is not the case in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa or elsewhere in Pakistan, according to Mr. Alam.
The senior police officer said it would be a major improvement if MLOs visited the crime scene.
However, according to him, there were many factors responsible for the poor investigation practices.
“In several instances, the victims’ bodies are taken to a hospital by their family members or volunteers,” said the police officer.
Practically, every public sector hospital, said a doctor, should have a qualified MLO, but that was not the case. As a result, medical officers posted at hospitals perform as MLOs in case if a murder case victims or wounded brought in a hospital.
MLO’s job, said the police officer, required experienced and seasoned hands, but not many hospitals in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had trained MLOs.
Doctors working as MLOs, said the police officer, should be well versed with their role prescribed under the law. “MLOs opinion hold great significance, earlier they used to define (in their autopsy reports) whether the death has been a cause of grievous hurt or a simple hurt, now under the new system there are 35 types of hurt and MLOs are required to know about all types,” said the police officer.
Experts said that MLO’s problems were not only police specific. MLOs, said the doctor, usually faced a lot of pressure from the victims’ family members. “MLOs are made to work in haste while conducting autopsies (in murder cases) as the family members (of the victim) make them to immediately hand over the dead bodies for timely burial,” said a forensic medicine expert.
