RAWALPINDI: A man who allegedly kidnapped his four-and-a-half year old niece early this month, after her mother refused to lend him Rs10,000, was seized and handed to the city police on Friday when he brought the girl dead to the distraught family.

“My little Jennifer was subjected to sever torture before being killed during detention,” Amanat Masih, the father, told Dawn, at his house in the city’s Raja Sultan locality.

But the Banni police, who was informed by him soon after his daughter disappeared on August 3, said the cause of death of Jennifer alias Jannat Bibi would be known after postmortem.

Sub-Inspector Imtiaz Hussain, investigating the case, quoted the arrested suspect Shahbaz as saying she died of sickness.

Amanat said his brother-in-law Shahbaz abducted Jennifer from his house on August 3 while the parents were away.

Shahbaz remained incommunicado until Thursday when he broke the devastating news to the family that he was bringing the body of her niece, according to the father.

On Friday morning, Shahbaz arrived in a taxi with the body and tried to flee after delivering it, he said. But neighbours foiled the attempt, seized him and handed him over to the police.

“My daughter was detained in a house in the Chontra police precinct, tortured and killed by the kidnapper. But the real cause of her death will be known after the postmortem report is received,” Amanat told Dawn.

Police investigator Imtiaz Hussain, however, said: “There were no apparent torture marks on her body. The cause of her death is yet to be determined.”

Published in Dawn, August 30th, 2014