After eight years, ATC finds the four guilty of having planned and executed Sheikh Muhammad Mansoor’s July 2008 kidnapping and gruesome murder
Karachi
Two men and two women were on Tuesday sentenced to death by an anti-terrorism court (ATC) on Tuesday for the July 2008 kidnapping and murder of Sheikh Muhammad Mansoor, the owner of a popular Clifton fast food restaurant, Karachi Broast.
The four convicts – Mohsin Raza, his wife Shazia Raza, Nazia Rasheed and Syed Adnan Haider – had planned and executed the kidnapping in Clifton’s Boat Basin area on July 3, 2008.
While the prosecution maintained that Mansoor was abducted from an apartment building, there were media reports that the two women had pretended their car had broken down and their partners-in-crime swooped in when Mansoor stopped to help.
The charge sheet further stated that Mansoor was then kept confined in an apartment in Liaquatabad while the abductors negotiated with his family over the ransom amount.
When a deal did not materialise, the convicts killed Mansoor, cut up his body into pieces and dumped them in Rizvia Society in gunny bags. The FIR registered by the Clifton police at the time was under sections of the Pakistan Penal Code related to abduction, murder and common intent.
At yesterday’s hearing, after reviewing all evidence, the court ruled that Nazia and Shazia had played an equally significant role in the kidnapping, and sentenced all four accused to hang till death.
Cop’s murder
The administrative judge of ATCs extended the remand of three accused – Syed Muhammad Haider Zaidi, Shiraz Haider Zaidi and Tauseef Ali alias Iftikhar Bobby – facing charges of murdering a policeman till February 6.
According to police, the suspects had killed Assistant Sub-Inspector (ASI) Jamaluddin on November 23, 2013 in the Bahadurabad police limits and a case had been registered at the station under Section 302 (premeditated murder) and 34 (common intent) of the Pakistan Penal Code read with Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997.
The court also directed the investigation officer to submit a final charge sheet at the next hearing.