Convict files appeal

Appellant Nizami was sentenced to life imprisonment by ATC III headed by Judge Ghulam Mustafa Memon.

KARACHI:

An appellate bench of the Sindh High Court ordered on Friday notices to be issued to the provincial home secretary and Anti-Terrorism Court III for March 15 in an appeal filed by an accused convicted and sentenced for the murder of a doctor of a rival sect in 2003.

Appellant Muhammad Atif Nizami was sentenced to life imprisonment by ATC III headed by Judge Ghulam Mustafa Memon on December 17 2011. A convict has seven days to file an appeal under the Anti-Terrorism Act of 1997 but he was unaware of the law and filed it quite late.

However, the bench comprising Justice Maqbool Baqar and Justice Nisar Muhammad Shaikh perused the appeal sent by the appellant from prison who appealed to the court to allow him to plead his own case. The bench then ordered the office of the high court to issue notices to the respondents besides the Sindh advocate general for March 15. The court also ordered the production of the appellant on that date.

According to the prosecution, some unidentified assailants fired and killed Dr Syed Ibne Hussain on August 16, 2003 in the limits of Malir city police station. As no clue was found, the case was closed in 2005. Later, on May 5, 2006, the accused man was arrested by the police which allegedly recovered some explosives and a TT pistol from his possession. He was tried and convicted by ATC III against which the instant appeal was filed by him.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 19^th, 2012.