Wife among three arrested for murder of hotel owner

Charred body of victim, identified as Mohammad Farooq, was recovered from his burnt car at a garbage dump

RAWALPINDI:

Morgah police have solved the mystery of the murder of a hotel owner and arrested three persons including the wife.

The charred body of the victim, identified as Mohammad Farooq, 50, was recovered from his burnt car at a garbage dump in Morgah last Friday.

Police sources said that the victim's second wife, Yasmeen, her acquaintance Waheed and his friend Idrees were produced before a local court for their physical remand. The court granted a five-day for the arrested suspects. The sources said that the victim’s wife, Yasmeen, 55, wanted to marry Waheed, 22, before fleeing the country to settle in broad after selling the property of the owner of De Mall Hotel in Rawalpindi Saddar.

After the incident, police gathered evidence including footage of closed-circuit cameras and an investigation was launched by filing a murder case against unknown suspects.

According to the sources, when the police approached the deceased wife, who resides in a private housing society on GT Road, she denied that the victim visited her.

The police expanded the scope of the investigation and included the victim’s second wife, who had been married to him for a long time, who said in an initial statement that Chaudhry Farooq did not visit her on the day of the incident. Police also searched for a motorcyclist seen in the CCTV footage near the crime scene where the vehicle and the body were found burnt.

During the investigation, it transpired that the victim's wife had made a few calls on the day of the incident. Police interrogated the victim's second wife, who gave contradictory statements. Police later took her into custody, who confessed to killing her husband with her acquaintance Waheed, 22, who worked as a mechanic at her residence.

According to an investigating police officer, Yasmeen planned to marry Waheed and go abroad with him.

According to him, Yasmeen called her husband at her residence, where Waheed strangled him and killed him and later, he along with his friend Idrees took the body in the victim’s car to a deserted place in Morgah and set it on fire. The charred body was later recovered by the police.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 6^th, 2022.