Murder most foul: Woman kills husband, children, herself

RAWALPINDI:

A woman allegedly poisoned her husband and two children to death before taking her own life in the jurisdiction of Airport police on Monday.

Police say the woman, identified as Shahida, made a call to one of her in-laws, Muhammad Basharat, around 4:30am and said she had killed her husband and kids and was now committing suicide.

Alerted by Basharat, police say they went to the house in Dhoke Chaudhrian and found the door locked. “(After breaking the locks), We found the man and the two children lying on a bed, while the woman’s body was hanging from the ceiling fan,” said Airport SHO Waseem Faraz.

The other deceased were identified as Shahid Abbas, six-year-old Adil and 10-month-old Areesha Fatima. Legs of Abbas and the children were tied with a rope.

“They might have been poisoned because we did not find any weapon or external wounds. We have sent the house items to the laboratory for examination,” said the SHO, adding there were no signs of torture on the bodies.

The bodies were shifted to the DHQ Hospital for autopsy where officials confirmed they were poisoned to death.

Abbas’s brother, Faizan Abbas, told The Express Tribune that his brother wanted to marry another woman and his 28-year-old wife was not happy about it. “They would often quarrel after he informed Shahida that he wanted to arrange another marriage,” he said.

He said his brother had married Shahida two years ago. “It was the second marriage of both Abbas and Shahida, who had a six-year-old son from her first husband,” he said.

The family lived in a single-room rented house. He said Abbas, from Gujar Khan, worked as a daily wager and had no children with his first wife.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 28^th, 2014.