Capital crimes: Lawyers to challenge jail trial notifications

Dept notified 143 murder and blasphemy cases to be tried behind bars last week.

LAHORE:

Lawyers have challenged the Home Department’s notifications for 143 murder and blasphemy cases to be tried in jail because of security concerns at the District and Sessions Court,  has learnt.

The Home Department issued six notifications around a week ago naming the 143 murder and blasphemy cases that would be tried in jail. But several lawyers said that they believed the department did not have the authority to issue such notifications. They said that jail trials were a huge drain on judicial resources, as on the days a judge was hearing a case in a jail, he would not be able to conduct any other hearings.

Advocate Burhan Muazzam said that the six notifications had been issued under Paragraph 3 of Chapter I-A of the High Court Rules and Orders Volume III. He said that he had submitted applications to two additional district and sessions judges challenging the notifications as the Home Department did not have the authority to issue them. He said that the holding of trials behind closed doors was the prerogative of the presiding judge, who could hold jail trials if he felt there was a threat of violence in open court. He said that no judge had asked the Home Department to issue the notifications. He said that he would challenge the notifications in the Lahore High Court if his applications were not entertained.

Advocate Ghulam Mustafa Chaudhry questioned why the blasphemy trials were to be conducted in jail. He said there had been several recent instances of defendants in murder trials being killed at the Sessions Court, but none in blasphemy cases.

Home Department Deputy Secretary (Judicial) Dr Anees Ahmed Hashmi said that the notifications had been issued on the direction of the LHC owing to the sensitivity of the cases.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 12^th, 2013.