LAHORE: A Lahore High Court division bench on Tuesday set aside the death sentence of two murder convicts and acquitted them as the prosecution failed to establish its case.

Arshad and Asghar were awarded capital punishment by a sessions court of Gujrat in 2008 for killing Raja Sairas. They filed an appeal against the sentence.

The defence counsel argued the prosecution did not produce any eyewitness to the occurrence. He said there was a clear contradiction in autopsy report and statements of witnesses.

The bench allowed the appeal and set aside the conviction.

The bench also acquitted another convict, Shoaib, on the same grounds. A Faisalabad sessions court handed down death penalty to him for killing Fahad Ali in 2009.

The convict’s counsel argued the trial court acquitted three nominated suspects and convicted his client though he was not nominated by the police.

The counsel said police neither collected empties from the crime scene nor conducted identification parade of Shoaib.

The bench accepted the arguments and acquitted the convict.

Published in Dawn, January 28th, 2015

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