Man injured in ‘encounter’ dies

Family protests outside hospital, police station

KARACHI:

A man who was injured in an alleged police encounter in Hyderi died on Tuesday.

The family of the deceased staged a protest outside Abbasi Shaheed Hospital and Hyderi police station from where the young man had earlier been arrested in an injured condition.

Taking note of the incident, the Karachi police chief has ordered an inquiry. Reports suggested that two youths riding a motorcycle on Monday morning were signaled to stop by the police for a routine check near Premier College within the limits of the Hyderi police station.

Instead of stopping, however, the accused opened fire at the police and tried to escape. The police retaliated and one of the suspects on the motorcycle was injured by the police firing, while the other escaped from the scene.

According to the Pakistan Bazaar Station Investigation Officer (SIO) Javed Akhtar, the injured suspect was taken to court on Tuesday for physical remand after his medical examination at Abbasi Shaheed Hospital. However, his condition suddenly started deteriorating between in the afternoon on Tuesday.

He was rushed to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital where doctors pronounced him dead on arrival. The family members and relatives of the deceased reached Abbasi Shaheed Hospital and started protesting, chanting slogans for more than an hour against the police.

The heirs later took the body of the deceased to the Hyderi police station and continued the protest. The police officers assured protesters that they will be provided justice and the perpetrators will be brought to book. After the assurances, the demonstrators dispersed peacefully.

According to the heirs, 25-year-old Usman Aziz was innocent and had been killed in an illegal encounter.

The police caught him and injured him in a fake encounter and did not even provide medical treatment to him due to which he died, they claimed. The family added that the youngster was unmarried and a resident of Manghopir.

Karachi Police Chief Imran Yaqoob, while taking notice of the incident, ordered DIG West to probe the matter on merit and present an inquiry report.

According to SIO Pakistan Bazaar, the heirs took the body of the deceased without a postmortem examination. The actual cause of death will be ascertained after the postmortem of the deceased, he said.