‘Most wanted’: Serial killer arrested at Lahore Airport

Fugitive was wanted for killing eight people in a Kharian courthouse.

LAHORE:

Immigration officials at Lahore airport have arrested a man wanted for the killing of nine people, including eight in a single incident of mass murder inside a courthouse in Kharian.

Adalat Khan, a resident of Warraichanwala, a village in Gujrat district, was trying to flee to Abu Dhabi when he was intercepted by officials from the immigration wing of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).

He was wanted for the 2002 murder of a man named Ehsaan, a driver from a town in Gujrat. But he earned notoriety – and a “red warrant” from Interpol – for his second act of violence, when he murdered eight people at a courthouse in Kharian on June 9, 2005 to settle a personal vendetta.

On the request of the Punjab police, the Interpol, an organisation facilitating international police co-operation, had issued an arrest warrant, also known as a ‘red warrant’, against Khan after he managed to escape the country five years ago.

Khan was boarding a flight for Abu Dhabi, from Lahore airport, when the Personal Identification Secure Comparison and Evaluation System identified him as ‘wanted’ by the Interpol and local police stations. The FIA immigration officers immediately notified the police officials concerned who arrested him.

Khan is currently in custody of the Dinga police, and will be handed over to the Saddar Kharian police after proceedings from the first case have been completed.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 25^th, 2011.