LAHORE, Nov 6: A division bench of the Lahore High Court (LHC) has set aside death sentence of a murder convict and life imprisonment of two while giving them the benefit of the doubt.

The convicts were involved in a murder case and an FIR was registered under sections 302, 324, 148 and 149 at Saddar Sammundri (Faisalabad district) police station. They had shot dead Sajjad and injured Asif in 2003.

On March 29, 2005, a court had awarded death sentence to Muhammad Ashfaq along with a fine of Rs100,000 and life imprisonment to Abdul Rehman and Abdul Rasheed. They were also ordered to pay Rs50,000 each as compensation to legal heirs of the deceased. The trial court, however, acquitted their co-accused Nasir Ali and Safiur Rehman.

The convicts had filed appeals against their sentence pointing out various lapses on the part of the prosecution.

The bench, headed by Justice Manzoor Ahmad Malik, also observed that the prosecution miserably failed to prove its case against the appellants/convicts as visual account was not in line with the medical evidence.

It further observed that the prosecution had to prove its case beyond any shadow of doubt and if any doubt arose from the circumstances of the case its benefit had to get to the accused persons.

Therefore, the bench extending the benefit of the doubt allowed the appeals and set aside the convictions and sentences recorded by the trail court.