Police seek FIA help in probing cryptocurrency trader’s kidnap for ransom

An anti-terrorism court on Wednesday remanded eight suspects, including two officers of the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD), in police custody for five more days in a case pertaining to alleged abduction of a cryptocurrency trader for ransom.

Investigating officer Makhdoom Moinuddin produced constables Ali Sajjad and Muhammad Umer along with six private suspects Haris Siddiqui alias Ashar, Mohammad Rizwan Shah, Tariq Hassan Shah alias Amir, Syed Muzamil Raza, Umer Jilani, and Noman Riffat, before the administrative judge of the anti-terrorism courts on expiry of their remand.

The IO stated that the eight suspects were previously remanded in police custody until January 7 and requested a 26-day extension in their remand in police custody to recover the ransom amount, arrest their fleeing accomplices and conduct their identification parade before a judicial magistrate.

He said that the relevant court had already accepted his plea for an identification parade of the suspects. He said that the suspects are required to be further interrogated about their facilitators and other accomplices, adding that he also needed their custody to check their past criminal record.

He further informed that suspects Hammad, Zamam alias Zaman, Muzamil, Ali Raza, Rashid Lodhi, Ali and three to four others were still at large. Therefore, the IO pleaded with the judge to grant their physical remand until February 3.

However, the magistrate granted five-day police remand of the suspects with a direction to the IO to produce them on completion of the remand. Separately, the IO told journalists that he had written a letter to the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to seek its assistance in the probe since the case involves payment of the ransom from the complainant's Binance account.

The suspects were arrested after Mohammad Arsalan, involved in the cryptocurrency business, lodged an FIR with the Manghopir police station on December 27, stating that he was kidnapped from Manghopir and released after payment of a ransom of $340,000.

The FIR was lodged under sections 365-A (kidnapping or abducting for extorting property, valuable security, etc) and 34 (common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code read with Section 7 (punishment for acts of terrorism) of the Anti-Terrorism Act.

The complainant stated that private individuals, under the pretext of buying dollars, used a police mobile with police officers in plain clothes to kidnap him. They then took him from Manghopir to a spot near the Saddar passport office, where they transferred around $340,000 from his Binance account to their different accounts. After that they abandoned him near the Quaid’s Mazar.