In an act of convoluted bravery, or stupidity, a car thief managed to sneak into the parking lot of the highly protected Supreme Court (SC) on Wednesday and almost succeeded in lifting a car. He was unlocking Punjab Deputy Secretary Interior Shoaib Warraich’s Honda City when the driver noticed him moments before he succeeded.
By the time, the driver, Muhammad Shaukat, reached the car, the carjacker had almost unlocked the vehicle using one of the dozens of master keys he was carrying with him. On being found out, the car thief tried to escape but he was chased by Shaukat with the help of other drivers and some employees of the Supreme Court.
“We saw him unlocking the car only minutes after it was parked there by the driver and we went to check what he was up to,” said one of the employees of the Supreme Court who had participated in catching the thief but did not want to be named.
The car thief was later identified as Muhammad Israr, a resident of Mardan. The car was parked near the boundary fence of the Prime Minister Secretariat.
He was taken to the office of the Deputy Superintendent of Police (Supreme Court) where he was briefly detained before the Secretariat police arrested him and shifted him to a lock-up.
During the initial investigations, Israr told the police that he had entered the Supreme Court parking pretending to be a petitioner. “One of his brothers is already in jail at Haripur. He is being detained for drug peddling and Israr had come to the SC to file a bail appeal for him,” said a police official who is investigating him.
Police recovered more than 12 different types of master keys which Israr uses to unlock cars and then start the ignition. “He had keys of almost every car from Toyota Corolla to jeeps like Pajero,” said the police official.
The police obtained a two-day physical remand for Israr and were hopeful that he would divulge information on stolen cars from Islamabad during further investigations.
Israr was also carrying a pistol with him which he had hidden somewhere outside the Supreme Court premises. Police recovered the gun after Israr told them its location.
The police registered cases of attempted car theft and carrying an illegal weapon against the suspect.
Published in The Express Tribune, October 20th, 2011.
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