TV reporter’s murder: Two men sentenced to death in absentia

ATC sentences four others to life, days after reporter’s third death anniversary.

KARACHI:

A special Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) handed down death sentences to two absconders and life imprisonment to four others found guilty of murdering television reporter Wali Khan Babar in 2011.

What is believed to be the first-ever case in which a journalist’s murderers are punished, the ATC took three years to conclude the trial during which six witnesses were also killed on different occasions.

Judge Mushtaq Leghari of the ATC Kandhkot, pronounced the verdict inside the penitentiary heavily guarded by the police and Frontier Constabulary personnel.

Babar, aged 28, was shot dead in the Liaquatabad locality of Karachi while driving home from office in the limits of the Super Market police station on January 13, 2011, and the murder case was lodged the same day.

Police had arrested four suspects, including Faisal Mehmood alias Nafsiyati, Naveed alias Polka, Muhammad Ali Rizvi, Shahrukh alias Manni and Shakil Malik in the city on April 7, 2011.

However, the trial was stalled as six witnesses associated with the case were killed in targeted attacks in different parts of the city.

Investigators submitted the final charge-sheet on April 25, declaring the arrested accused and the absconders as murderers of the journalist.

Initially, the trial court framed the charges against the accused on October 21, 2011, but they were finally arraigned in the case on February 27, 2012.

On October 19, the Sindh High Court directed the concerned ATC to wrap up the case within 45 days. Later, SHC Chief Justice Maqbool Baqar on the provincial home department’s request transferred the trial from the anti-terrorism court of Karachi to the anti-terrorism court in Kashmore-Kandhkot district on November 8.

Pronouncing the verdict on Saturday, Judge Leghari convicted two absconding accused Faisal Mehmood and Kamran Zeeshan to death sentences. Four co-accused were hand down a life term. The court, however, acquitted Shakil Malik of the charges, observing that the prosecution failed to establish the allegations levelled against him and the eyewitness failed to identify him.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 2^nd, 2014.