Date for gang-rape convicts’ execution extended
Faisalabad, June 14 2006: The execution date of four convicted rapists has been extended for five days and an anti-terrorism court (ATC) judge has issued stay orders in this regard, sources told Daily Times on June 13. June 17 has been fixed as the new date for their execution. Earlier, the court had issued order and fixed June 13 for their execution.
The convicts are Omar Hayat of Chak 106 RB in Khurrianwala, Mubarak Ali of Chak 134 RB, Ashraf and Shahzad.
According to the prosecution, Bashir Maseeh, a sanitary worker of Chak 144 RB, filed an application with the Jhumrah police stating that on the night of November 6, 1999, he was asleep with his family when the accused broke into his house and raped his daughter Saima. Before fleeing, Bashir alleged the rapists also took cash, gold ornaments and other valuables. ATC Judge Chaudhry Mohammad Ikram, finding the four accused men guilty, handed them death sentences on December 18, 1999. However, their execution dates have been extended three times.
Though they have been convicted, the four men still claim innocence and say that the case is bogus. A district jail officer, on condition of anonymity, told Daily Times that the convicts said that Bashir had presented a fictitious case on the directions of Abdullah, a landlord of the area. According to the convicts, Abdullah had used Bashir against them as they had previously raised their voices against Abdullah’s illegal occupation of Younas Maseeh’s land, another resident of the area.
The officer said despite their appeals to various human rights organisations, no organisation had visited the four men in the seven years of their detention. The convicts said that the present government was politicising rape cases and was thus not allowing their pardon. They said that the plaintiff and his family had pardoned them, but the court had not.
Source: Daily Times
Date:6/14/2006
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