Convicted murderer: First civilian to hang in six years

RAWALPINDI:

A district and sessions judge has ordered the Adiala Jail superintendent to hang a murder convict on September 18.

Rawalpindi District and Sessions Judge Abdul Sattar had found Shoaib Sarwar guilty and awarded him a death sentence on July 2, 1998. Sarwar was accused of murdering Awais Nawaz on January 21, 1996 in Wah Cantt.

The Lahore High Court’s Rawalpindi bench rejected the appeal to overturn the sessions court’s verdict in July 2, 2003 and on April 3, 2006, the Supreme Court confirmed the sentence. The convict’s plea for clemency was also denied by the presidency.

The victim’s brother, Jamshed Nawaz, had moved the high court against the delay in implementing the court verdict despite exhaustion of all appeals by the convict. The high court ordered the district and sessions judge to implement the execution of the sentence.

Sarwar, who is imprisoned in Haripur, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, will be shifted to Adiala Jail next week. Jail sources say the family visitation is scheduled for September 17.

The convict’s relatives have once again asked the president to overturn the sentence and are also trying to settle the issue through blood money.

There has been no execution of a civilian convict since 2008. Former President Asif Ali Zardari issued an unofficial moratorium on November 14, 2008 which expired on June 30, 2013. In between, a former army soldier was executed in Mianwali jail in 2012.

According to Amnesty International, there are more than 8,000 prisoners on death row in Pakistan.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 7^th, 2014.