Man sentenced to death in triple murder case
PESHAWAR: Peshawar High Court has set aside the acquittal of a man in an honour-related triple murder of his siblings and sentenced him to death on three counts.
A bench consisting of Justice Sahibzada Asadullah and Justice Farah Jamshed accepted an appeal filed by the state, challenging the acquittal of the suspect, Haider Khan, by an additional sessions judge in Kohat on Jan 4, 2024.
The respondent was charged for the offence in an FIR registered at Kohat Cantt police station on Sep 30, 2022, under sections 302/324 of Pakistan Penal Code. The mother of the deceased persons and the suspect, Assia Bibi, was complainant in the FIR.
She reported the matter to the police, stating that she was present in her house in the company of her son Salman and daughters Laila and Aleena, when her other son namely Haider (the suspect) entered the house and started firing at them.
She said that as a result of firing, her three children sustained injuries and died on the spot, whereas she remained unhurt. The suspect fled the scene of occurrence and was subsequently arrested by the police.
The complainant claimed that the motive behind the occurrence was a domestic dispute. The bench pointed out in its judgement that the motive behind the occurrence was honour-related as the accused was suspicious about conduct of the deceased persons.
The bench, in its 38-page detailed judgement threadbare discussed different aspects of the case including the evidence on record, the statement of the complainant, confessional statement of the suspect, and whether any mitigating circumstances were available so as not to award death penalty to him and instead award him life imprisonment.
The bench observed that the evidence on record established culpability and the deliberate course of his (suspect) conduct. “In these circumstances, we hold that the sentence of death under Section 302(b), PPC, is warranted on each of the three counts,” the bench ruled.
The complainant had charged the suspect for killing her other three children, however, in cross examination during trial she expressed that she would have no objection to his acquittal.
“The house was the family’s common residence and the respondent himself stated that his divorced sister was residing there. The recovery of blood and crime empties from different parts of that house, when considered alongside the removal of the three bodies to the hospital and the medical findings, leaves no substantial uncertainty concerning the place of the killings or their homicidal character,” the bench observed.
Published in Dawn, November 13th, 2026
