Mysterious circumstances: Caught with explosives near sit-in, man dies in custody
Doctors, police officials believe suspect’s drug addiction led to his death
PHOTO: REUTERS
ISLAMABAD:
A man, who had been arrested with explosives near the Faizabad sit-in on November 20, has died under mysterious circumstances in custody.
Police and the doctors, meanwhile, have blamed the suspect’s drug addiction for the man’s death.
Officials posted around the sit-in, which saw over 2,000 supporters of Tehreek-e-Labbaik Ya Rasool Allah (TLYR) block the Faizabad interchange at the confluence of Islamabad and Rawalpindi closed for 19 days, had stopped 38-year-old Shah Faisal for checking on the Islamabad Expressway.
After officials recovered explosives from his motorbike at the Garden Avenue interchange, a kilometre away from Faizabad, he was arrested and the explosives confiscated.
Police said Faisal, who was riding a motorbike travelling from Taxila to Rawat, had tried to speed away after officials at a picket flagged him down. However, officials managed to chase and nab him.
A subsequent search of the motorbike unearthed 192 sticks of explosives, 492 detonators, and 300 safety fuse metres.
During questioning, Faisal maintained that the explosives were meant for blasting at a stone mining and crushing operation — a common practice. Faisal’s father, hailing from Malakand in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, later produced a government-issued licence to carry and possess explosives of up to five kilogrammes.
The police, however, found that the suspect was carrying much more than what the permit allowed and that too without adopting any safety measure.
The Aabpara police kept Faisal in their lock-up for two days after which a court sent him on judicial remand to the Adiala Jail on November 23.
However, on the evening of November 30, he was rushed to the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) from the jail. Doctors at the hospital, though, pronounced Faisal as dead on arrival.
Pims Medico-Legal Officer Dr Irshad said the man had probably died because of severe drug withdrawal.
“We were told that he was a drug addict and died of withdrawal effect. His family did not request a post-mortem examination and took the body, [without an autopsy]” Dr Irshad told The Express Tribune.
A police officer, while talking to The Express Tribune, said that during the two-days which Faisal spent in police lock-up, they had observed that he was heavily addicted to some sort of drug.
Asked about the explosives recovered from him, the officer said that the explosives were typically used at stone crushing operations and were quite different from those used by terrorists.
Moreover, the official said that during a background check into Faisal, they had not found any link to terrorism and that perhaps the only charge Faisal was probably guilty of was that he was carrying explosives more than the allowed limit and that he was not following the proper safety guidelines.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 3rd, 2017.
A man, who had been arrested with explosives near the Faizabad sit-in on November 20, has died under mysterious circumstances in custody.
Police and the doctors, meanwhile, have blamed the suspect’s drug addiction for the man’s death.
Officials posted around the sit-in, which saw over 2,000 supporters of Tehreek-e-Labbaik Ya Rasool Allah (TLYR) block the Faizabad interchange at the confluence of Islamabad and Rawalpindi closed for 19 days, had stopped 38-year-old Shah Faisal for checking on the Islamabad Expressway.
After officials recovered explosives from his motorbike at the Garden Avenue interchange, a kilometre away from Faizabad, he was arrested and the explosives confiscated.
Police said Faisal, who was riding a motorbike travelling from Taxila to Rawat, had tried to speed away after officials at a picket flagged him down. However, officials managed to chase and nab him.
A subsequent search of the motorbike unearthed 192 sticks of explosives, 492 detonators, and 300 safety fuse metres.
During questioning, Faisal maintained that the explosives were meant for blasting at a stone mining and crushing operation — a common practice. Faisal’s father, hailing from Malakand in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, later produced a government-issued licence to carry and possess explosives of up to five kilogrammes.
The police, however, found that the suspect was carrying much more than what the permit allowed and that too without adopting any safety measure.
The Aabpara police kept Faisal in their lock-up for two days after which a court sent him on judicial remand to the Adiala Jail on November 23.
However, on the evening of November 30, he was rushed to the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) from the jail. Doctors at the hospital, though, pronounced Faisal as dead on arrival.
Pims Medico-Legal Officer Dr Irshad said the man had probably died because of severe drug withdrawal.
“We were told that he was a drug addict and died of withdrawal effect. His family did not request a post-mortem examination and took the body, [without an autopsy]” Dr Irshad told The Express Tribune.
A police officer, while talking to The Express Tribune, said that during the two-days which Faisal spent in police lock-up, they had observed that he was heavily addicted to some sort of drug.
Asked about the explosives recovered from him, the officer said that the explosives were typically used at stone crushing operations and were quite different from those used by terrorists.
Moreover, the official said that during a background check into Faisal, they had not found any link to terrorism and that perhaps the only charge Faisal was probably guilty of was that he was carrying explosives more than the allowed limit and that he was not following the proper safety guidelines.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 3rd, 2017.