Justice served: Man sentenced to 14 years for injuring boy in bomb blast

KARACHI: An anti-terrorism court sentenced on Saturday a man to 14 years in jail after finding him guilty of injuring a child in a bomb blast.

Mumtaz Hussain was arrested in April 2013 on charges of causing an explosion with the intent to murder. According to the prosecution, he had injured Zeeshan, 12, by throwing a ball bomb in a bid to spread terror in Faqeera Goth, Sohrab Goth. Hussain was remanded in the case by ATC-I and a few hearings later, his case was transferred to ATC-IV. Throughout the two-year-long trial, the suspect kept denying the charges against him.

However, testimonies of the prosecution witnesses and of the injured child, all went against him. The child also identified him as the attacker and deposed that the suspect threw the bomb in the street when he was coming back from school.

Based on the evidence, the judge, Anandram D Sairani, convicted the suspect and handed him a collective sentence of 24 years. He was sentenced to 14 years imprisonment for causing the explosion and 10 years for attempting to murder. However, since both the sentences will run concurrently, only the longest jail term will be counted as the imprisonment time.

The court also directed the convict to pay compensation of Rs50,000 to victim, failing which he would serve an additional six months in prison.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 12^th, 2015.