Bad Company: 14-year-old ‘set on fire by friends’

Boy's father nominated five people in the FIR registered with Mansoorabad police.

FAISALABAD:

A 14-year-old boy was burned allegedly by his friends after he reported them for sexual assault. One of the suspects in police custody said the fire was an accident. 

The boy was taken to Allied Hospital in a Rescue 1122 ambulance. Doctors treating him said he would likely survive.

His father nominated five people in the FIR registered with Mansoorabad police.

He said the suspects, all his son’s friends, had taken him to an abandoned house and tried to rape him. When he resisted, they set fire to his clothes.

Some passers-by called the Rescue 1122 and the boy was taken to Allied Hospital, where he was reported to have suffered 30 per cent burns on his back. The father said he had stopped him from meeting the boys as they were not a good company to hang out with, but he didn’t listen.

The station house officer said one of the suspects had been arrested.

He said the boy had told police that they had had an arrangement over buying petrol for a rented motorcycle. He said he owed his friends some money.

He said no one tried to rape him and that his shirt had caught fire by accident. He said his friends had fled in panic.

The SHO said the police were waiting for the medico-legal examination report.

Police were meanwhile looking for the remaining suspects, he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 21^st, 2013.