Alleged police front man collecting extortion wins bail from SHC

Court tells him to surrender before the ATC, which has initiated trial against him for extortion.

KARACHI:

A suspect, allegedly working as a front man for the policemen involved in collecting bhatta (protection money) from the shopkeepers, won ‘protective’ bail from the Sindh High Court (SHC).

A division bench, headed by Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, granted him bail against the surety of Rs20,000. The judge also directed him to surrender before the anti-terrorism court-I, which has initiated trial against him, under extortion and terror charges.

Abdul Sattar had filed an application with the high court, seeking pre-arrest bail to avoid his arrest by the Sharae Faisal. He won the bail on Friday.

The prosecution had alleged that Sattar along with his accomplices used to collect bhatta from the vendors and shopkeepers on the instruction of head constable Rahat Ali and constable Zafar.

The police caught him red-handed from Jauhar Chowrangi and allegedly recovered Rs20,000 extortion money from his possession, along with nine SIM cards of different cellular networks on March 28. An FIR No. 238/2014 lodged under Sections 384, 385 and 43 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) was also lodged against him.

The prosecution claimed that the suspect had disclosed during interrogation that he used to pay Rs218,000 every month to Rahat and Rs16,000 to Zafar out of the total extorted money.

Filing bail application, his lawyer Nayyar Ziauddin argued that the police had implicated his client, who himself is a vendor and denied the allegations of collecting extortion. Sattar has been arrested merely on the statement given by co-accused Liaquat to the police in custody, which has no admissibility before the court of law.

The lawyer pleaded the court grant bail to the applicant, who wants to surrender before the ATC-I and join proceedings but apprehends his arrest by the police. The bench granted him protective pre-arrest bail against Rs20,000 surety for seven days and ordered him to surrender before the trial court.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 6^th, 2014.