RAWALPINDI, May 28: A young man gunned down five employees of a Pirwadhai hotel in pre-dawn hours on Monday when he didn’t like the room and the hotel staff refused to return him the room rent, police said.

In his dying statement Hazrat Omer, 17, who had joined the two-storey Khan Inn less than 24 hours earlier, told the police that the culprit checked-in around 3:15am but got into a brawl with receptionist Munir, 19, while negotiating rent and then shot him dead in cold blood.

Omer, who was also hit, died in a hospital in the afternoon.

Three other employees who arrived on hearing the gunshots were also killed by the frenzied guest one after the other as they tried to overpower him.

A guest staying in the hotel, Faisal Mehmood, who rushed to the scene on hearing gunshots and their screams, was also hit by the flying bullets.

He is now lying in the Holy Family Hospital in a stable condition.

In his statement to the police Faisal said the killer fled the scene after his killing spree.

More people arrived at the bloody scene after the young angry man, around 20 and in shalwar-kameez, had escaped. Police had already sealed off Khan Inn when they reached there and did not allow anyone in, witnesses from the neighbourhood said.

Superintendent of Police Chaudhry Mohammad Hanif of Rawal Division told Dawn that the killer had been identified and two suspects arrested.

“They (the suspects) are being investigated in the light of some vital clues collected from the crime scene,” he said, hoping the killer would be arrested “within 24 hours”.

Police collected 11 empty cases of bullets fired from a 30-bore pistol from the crime scene and took in possession some record and documents of the Khan Inn.

Owner of the Inn Mohammad Irfan, who belongs to Sialkot, had also been detained for investigation, the officer said.

SP Hanif’s refusal to share the identity of the killer and the reasons behind the arrest of the two suspects and the owner of the hotel added mystery to the crime.

Meanwhile, SHO Raja Abdul Rasheed of Pirwadhai Police Station has dismissed rumours that swept the area after the wholesale murder of five young employees of the Khan Inn that they were targeted for their alleged involvement in “immoral activities”. They were all aged between 17 and 23 and belonged Swat, Buner and Mardan.

Bodies of the hotel employees Munir, 19, Hazrat Omer, 17, Bashir Alam, 23, Mubashir alias Chara, 20, and Mohammad Wali, 21, were handed to their relatives.

SHO Rasheed is leading the investigation. He told Dawn that an unidentified man came to the Khan Inn and asked the receptionist for a room. The customer gave his identity and paid Rs200 rent.

But he did not like the room the staff took him to and returned to the receptionist and demanded his money back as he did not want to stay there.

A quarrel ensued during which the unhappy guest pulled out his pistol and shot dead the receptionist — and later targeted other hotel staff one-by-one, the officer said.