Shehzad was murdered for his taxi

Altaf, who confessed that he committed the murder, is the son of an ASI.

ISLAMABAD: City police arrested three men for murdering a taxi driver and stealing his vehicle.

On October 8, the body was recovered from Rawal Lake, which was badly decomposed.

The secretariat police published pictures and details of the taxi driver in newspapers, hoping to find his family.

The case was transferred to the Criminal Investigation Agency (CIA) for further investigations. The CIA officials succeeded in finding the family of the deceased with the help of his clothing and other belongings.

He belonged to Silanwali area of Sargodha city and was identified as Amir Shehzad. His family had been looking for him after he went missing on October 5. The 23-year-old was a civilian employee in Pakistan Air Force and was living at the residence of an officer in PAF Complex sector E-9. He used to run a taxi for extra income.

The family of the deceased told the police that his cell phone was also missing since his disappearance. “We traced the men with the help of the deceased’s cell phone,” said the investigation officer.

One of the suspects, Altaf, was arrested from Sohan area of Rawalpindi with the help of this cell phone. Altaf revealed the names of his other two accomplices, Naveed and Asim, who were later arrested by CIA officials from Khanna area of Rawalpindi.

“During interrogation, the arrested mens confessed to killing Shehzad and stealing his taxi,” said CIA police.

On the night of October 5, they had hired Shehzad’s taxi for Murree from Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences.

“The next morning we strangled him and threw him into Rawal Lake,” suspects told the police. Two days after his death, some passerby spotted his body near Rawal Lake, half submerged in the water. It took police more than 20 days to arrest the suspects.

The men told the police that they killed Shehzad because they wanted to steal his car.

One of the suspects, Naveed was a motor mechanic and his accomplice Altaf was the son of an Assistant Sub-Inpsector (ASI) of police.

After dumping the body, the three men took Shehzad’s Suzuki FX, registration number FDP 2046, to Naveed’s garage and disassembled it. Naveed sold the parts and gave Rs5000 to Asim and Rs3500 to Altaf (who was also given the cell phone of the victim). “The rest of the car was taken care of by Naveed himself,” Altaf told the police. The three men were booked for murder and sent to jail on judicial remand.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 7^th, 2010.