Pleading for mercy: Court returns appeal to hold Saulat Mirza’s death warrants

‘The petition did not contain the relevant documentation’

KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) returned on Thursday a petition seeking deferment of execution of the convict affiliated with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, Saulat Mirza, due to lack of documents.

Sumera Wajahat, the sister of Mirza had filed what appeared to be a hurriedly drafted two-page petition, citing the Anti-Terrorism Court-V of Karachi as the sole respondent.

She stated that the ATC on Wednesday issued black warrants for the execution of Mirza at Machh Jail, Balochistan, on March 19.

The petition stated that on behalf of Mirza, his brother had already filed a criminal miscellaneous application with the Supreme Court with a prayer to hold the black warrants. Wajahat pleaded the high court to put the black warrants on hold till the final decision by the apex court.

Objection

The court officials, however, observed that the petition lacked important documents, such as copies of the ATC’s black warrants and certified copies of the trial court’s judgment. They also pointed out that none of the authorities, except the ATC-V, had been named as respondent. The officials advised the petitioner’s lawyer, Akram Qureshi, to remove these objections by providing the missing documents and naming all the necessary parties as respondents by Friday.

Mirza, a convicted target killer, was sentenced to death in 1999 on charges of murdering the former managing director of Karachi Electric Supply Corporation, Shahid Hamid, along with his driver, Ashraf Brohi and guard, Akbar Khan, in July 1997 in DHA, Karachi.

Family speak out

Meanwhile, the convict’s wife accused the Pakistan courts of ‘murdering justice’ in relation to her husband’s conviction. Nikhat Saulat, accompanied by an elder brother and two sisters of the convict, was addressing a press conference at the Karachi Press Club (KPC) on Thursday.

Soon after the issuance of the blank warrant, Nikhat alleged that security personnel in plain clothes forcibly took away her brother, a cancer patient, in a bid to ‘”warn the family to avoid making any fuss.” She was of the belief that Mirza had already served the term, which is equivalent to life-imprisonment and his execution will be tantamount to serving him dual capital punishment.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 13^th, 2015.