Sialkot lynching case: Convicts file appeal in Lahore High Court

Say the court gave out the verdict ‘under pressure’.

LAHORE:

Several people convicted in the Sialkot lynching case appealed against their sentences in the Lahore High Court (LHC) on Saturday.

Those who filed an appeal include Jameel, Qaiser, Hassan Raza, Muhammad Akram, Rashid Nadeem, former District Police Officer (DPO) Sialkot Waqar Chohan and former Station House Officer (SHO) Waris Ali. On September 20, the Gujranwala Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) issued death sentences to seven of the accused, life imprisonment to six and three-year terms in prison to all of the police officials involved.

All the convicts have challenged their sentences. They said their culpability was not substantiated with evidence and that the court gave out the verdict ‘under pressure’ by the media and the public.

The main accused, Chohan, filed an appeal in the LHC through his counsel Faisal Shahzad Gondal, submitting that he was ‘innocent and wrongly convicted’ in the case.

On August 15, 2010, hundreds of people gathered in broad daylight in Buttran Wali, Sialkot, as victims Mughees and Muneeb were lynched, in full view of police officers who made no attempts to stop the killings. The bodies of the two brothers were dragged through the streets by the mob, who labelled them as robbers.

Meanwhile, the victims’ father moved the court against the acquittal of five of the accused people.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 25^th, 2011.