Preying on the weak: Four cops sent to jail in sexual assault case

Departmental inquiry recommended their expulsion from service; medical examination confirmed that the woman was raped

FAISALABAD:

Four officials of Peoples Colony police were sent to the Central Jail on Sunday after a department inquiry against them in a sexual assault case found them guilty and recommended their expulsion from service.

The suspects – Rizwan Javaid, Asif Mehmood, Basharat Ahmed and Ali Imran – were arrested and an FIR registered against them under Section 376 of the Pakistan Penal Code and Section 155 C of the Police Order of 2002. They have also been suspended from service.

A medical examination carried out at the Faisalabad district headquarters (DHQ) hospital had confirmed that the victim, a resident of Lahore who had come to Faisalabad to meet a relative, was beaten up and sexually assaulted.

Superintendent of Police Tahir Maqsood, who led the departmental inquiry into the incident, said DNA samples had also been sent for chemical examination.

He said he had recommended that the suspects be expelled from service. He said there was sufficient evidence to prove their involvement in the crime.

A report in this regard would be sent to the court within a week.

In her statement to the police at the hospital, the woman had alleged that she was abducted by the suspects from a rickshaw she was riding to her relatives’ house. She said the officials had asked her for identity documents. “They started demanding a bribe to let me go when I told them that I was not carrying my identity card,” she said. She said later they kidnapped her and took her to a hotel on Satiana Road where she was sexually assaulted.

She said she was abandoned on a roadside from where a relative took her to the hospital. The relative also reported the matter to the police.

The police inquiry, however, concluded that the ‘relative’ was colluding with the suspects.

SP Maqsood said investigation had revealed that the woman was tricked. “[The complainant] took her to the hotel under a deal with the suspects,” he said.

He said witnesses had stated that the relative was standing guard in front of the hotel.

He said he had later consulted a sub inspector and reported the matter to the police on his advice.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 13^th, 2012.