Cop killed in ‘encounter’, family protests

SHO injured in shootout, says ‘criminal’ constable opened fire.

LAHORE:

A constable was killed in a shootout with other police officials in the early hours of Wednesday, with the family of the deceased calling it a revenge killing and the police describing it as a killing in self-defence.

According to an FIR registered at Gowalmandi police station on the complaint of Gowalmandi SHO Abdul Sattar, the SHO was on patrol with three gunmen and a driver just after midnight when they hailed two motorcyclists to stop near the Mominpura graveyard.

He said that the motorcyclists opened fire at the policemen, injuring the SHO and a passerby named Muhammad Umar. He said the police returned fire, killing one of the suspects. He said that the other suspect forced the driver out of the vehicle and sped away in it. The vehicle was later found abandoned.

But relatives of Constable Sajjad Ahmed rejected the police story. They placed the constable’s body on the road in front of the Lahore Press Club and staged a protest claiming that the SHO had a grudge against him and had murdered him. They said that Inspector Sattar and Ahmed had developed differences when they had worked together.

Maqsood Ahmed, the constable’s brother, said that Sajjad Ahmed was on his way home from Qila Gujjar Singh police station, where he worked, when he was killed. He said he believed that Sattar had shot himself to make the encounter look real. He demanded a judicial inquiry into the matter. Ahmed had been appointed a constable in 2005 and spent most of his service in Lahore.

Ahmed was hit by seven bullets, two in the head, four in the hand and one in the waist. The duty officer at Gowalmandi police station said that Ahmed was also wanted in a robbery FIR registered at Mustafabad police station. He said that the police had impounded the motorbike.

Capital City Police Officer Muhammad Aslam Tareen visited SHO Sattar in Mayo Hospital on Wednesday to ask after his health.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 17^th, 2012.