KARACHI: Police on Friday claimed to have arrested a woman and her son for their alleged involvement in killing of a teenage domestic help reportedly over theft of Rs20,000.

On Thursday, a woman travelling in a car had left the boy, aged around 13 to 14 years, near a private hospital in Bahadurabad and disappeared. The boy was tortured to death and an autopsy conducted at the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) showed that he was also subjected to a sexual assault.

Speaking at a press conference at his office, Karachi police chief Javed Odho termed it a “horrible” incident. He said the woman had left the ‘injured’ servant at the hospital and doctors declared him dead on arrival.

“The police have arrested car owner Samrin and her son and recovered the vehicle used in the crime,” said the police chief, regretting that the incidents of torture were on the rise as level of ‘intolerance’ had increased in the society.

Separately, East SSP Syed Abdul Raheem Shirazi told Dawn that the post-mortem examination suggested torture marks, sexual assault and strangulation. “If it’s proved that the boy was recently sexually assaulted then the police would interrogate the male members of the house and take their DNA samples,” he said.

He said that during initial investigation the woman’s son, who is in early 30s, confessed to have killed the boy for stealing Rs20,000. But, his mother told investigators that her daughters killed him as they caught him peeping inside the bathroom.

Published in Dawn, November 12th, 2022