LAHORE: A Dolphin Force squad on Saturday shot dead a youth allegedly hanging around with a knife after a brief chase on a road in Nawankot.

The incident that went viral on the social media sparked protest by the family who though admitted that “the mentally challenged youth had left home with a knife.” But the outrage grew after social circles and policemen took exception to the murder of the youth by the Dolphin Force who, they said, handled the case in the most unprofessional manner.

The video footages of the incident showed the cops chasing a young man on a Nawankot road near M Block. After a brief chase, a cop shot at the youth identified as Omair and the bullet pierced through his chest, killing him on the spot.

Officials say suspect knifed policeman and passersby

The police higher-ups claimed that the mentally challenged youth was equipped with a knife and had injured passersby. He also stabbed a Dolphin Force official, Mubashar, when he and his colleagues tried to overpower the suspect.

Iqbal Town Division SP Syed Ali in his initial report sent to the capital city police officer said the Dolphin Force responded to an emergency call (15) that an unidentified knife attacker had injured citizens. As the officials reached there, the youth also injured a policeman, he said, adding that an official later shot at him in self-defence.

Eyewitness accounts and mobile phone clips showed the youth running on the road and four Dolphin Force officials chasing him. One of them fired a shot on the suspect from behind, leaving him injured. The footage showed that no effort was made by the cops or the people who had gathered there to shift him to hospital. The youth was left unattended on the road in a pool of blood and he was later pronounced dead by the Dolphin Force personnel.

A police official, who spoke to Dawn on the request of anonymity, said the best option for a trained cop on such an occasion is to injure the suspect by shooting him on his leg to overpower or arrest him. He said the Dolphin Force official seemed untrained as he aimed at the chest of the fleeing youth.

It’s also a matter of concern that none of the officials tried to preserve the crime scene or isolate the evidence and it all showed a lack of professional training, he said. He said the incident had exposed the shortcomings in the Dolphin Force set-up and there was a question mark over training of officials by Turkish police.

The family of the deceased told the media that Omair had left home carrying a knife and they immediately followed him, alerting the passersby to avoid attack. They said the youth was on medication.

The murder sparked protest and the relatives and other people berated the Dolphin officials for killing the mentally challenged man. The protesters kept the body of the youth on the road where police baton-charged them to make way for the traffic.

It is the third incident in which armed personnel of the Squad had been accused of killing citizens on the pretext of chasing suspects. In May last, a team shot dead a 14-year-old youth while chasing suspects in Lahore’s Shadbagh area. The youth was filling bottles from a water cooler when a bullet hit him, causing his instant death.

Published in Dawn, November 4th, 2018