KARACHI: An eyewitness on Monday picked out a suspect during an identification parade before a judicial magistrate in a case pertaining to the killing of a paramilitary soldier.

Umair Hassan Siddiqui, said to an activist of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, has been booked for allegedly killing Rangers Lance Naik Shaukat and wounding another personnel near the Suparco office within the jurisdiction of the Mobina Town police station in December 2010.

The suspect was in police custody on physical remand and the investigation officer brought him to the city courts and produced him before a judicial magistrate for the identification parade amid tight security.

The magistrate conducted the identification parade after completing legal formalities. The suspect was lined up along with dummies as the court called the witness to identify him.

The eyewitness, who was also a paramilitary soldier and wounded in the attack, rightly picked out the suspect thrice among the dummies. While assigning his role in the commissioning of the alleged offence, the witness deposed that the suspect was the main shooter.

The Rangers had placed the suspect under 90-day preventive detention a few days after the March 11 raid on and around MQM headquarters Nine Zero. The paramilitary force contended that he confessed before a joint investigation team about his alleged involvements in dozens of cases pertaining to the targeted killing. Later, the Rangers handed him over to police.

The suspect has also been booked in a double murder case for allegedly killing two tea vendors, Niaz Gul and Iqbal Hussain, at their stall in Gulshan-i-Maymar in April 2013. The case was registered at the Mobina Town police station under Sections 302 (premeditated murder), 324 (attempted murder) and 34 (common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code read with Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997.

Published in Dawn, July 7th, 2015

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