Zainab murder case: Imran Ali to be executed on Oct 17

Judge Ahmad issues death warrants

LAHORE: An anti-terrorism court (ATC) in Lahore issued the black warrants for Imran Ali – convicted for the rape and murder of Zainab and 12 other minors – and scheduled his execution for October 17.

The black warrant for the convict was issued on Friday by Judge Sheikh Sajjad Ahmad – who authorised the superintendent to carry out the death sentence awarded to the convict.

Imran was convicted in February after being identified through DNA tests and was sentenced to death on one count, 25 years of imprisonment on two counts. In other cases, Imran was awarded death sentence on four counts and life imprisonment on one count. The sentence was awarded by Judge Ahmad.



The court issued the order after swiftly concluding Imran’s trial at Lahore’s Kot Lakhpat Jail, in accordance with an order of the Lahore High Court (LHC).



Case history

Zainab Amin was abducted on January 4 from near her aunt’s house in Kasur. Her body was recovered from a heap of garbage near her house five days later, sparking widespread protests in which two people also died because of the police firing.

The police later collected DNA samples of 1,187 people from January 12 to January 23 to trace the accused.  On January 23, the police arrested Imran, a neighbour of Zainab, as his DNA matched not only with the DNA samples collected from the body of Zainab but also at least seven other victims.



On February 10, the court handed over copies of the challan to the accused counsel in a hearing which was held in Kot Lakhpat jail and February 12 was fixed for framing of charges.

On February 12, the judge asked the accused whether he accepts the charges levelled against him in the challan. The accused refused to accept the charges after which the court indicted him in the case and started regular trial proceedings.

However, on the next day, Imran confessed to raping and killing Ayesha Asif, 7 [died on January 7, 2017], Eman Fatima, 7, [died on February 24, 2017], Noor Fatima,7 [died on April 11 2017], Laiba Saleem, 7 [died on July 8, 2017], Zaineb Amin, 7, [died on January 4, 2018] and others.