The Anti-Terrorist Court (ATC) on Saturday rejected the appeals filed by former City Police Officer (CPO) of Rawalpindi Saud Aziz and former Rawal Town SP Khurram Shahzad for their effective exoneration from the Benazir Bhutto murder case.
The hearing of the case was held in the court of Justice Shahid Rafique at Adiyala Jail. Aziz and Khurrum Shahzad, had pleaded in their appeals that there were no sufficient proofs against them in the case and therefore they should be exonerated. In the last hearing the court had reserved its verdict after hearing the arguments of the defence and prosecution lawyers with regard to the appeals.
The former Rawalpindi police chief and former SP have been accused of showing negligence in security arrangements for former premier Benazir Bhutto which resulted in her assassination at Liaquat Bagh. Later, the court deferred the hearing till October 22 to formally indict the accused in the case. Both the police officials moved their acquittal pleas under section 265-D stating that charges could not be framed against them since prosecution had failed to produce sufficient evidences against them.
The police officers argued that the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), probing the murder, had accused them of providing inadequate security to the slain prime minister and for destroying material evidences. However, they said they were being charged of terrorism, murder, attempt to murder and being part of criminal conspiracy.
They maintained that under the law, the charge of murder and terrorism could not be levelled against them since the investigation team had not provided any evidence to prove these allegations. However, the prosecution contended before the court that they had sufficient evidences against them. They told that these police officials directed to remove Elite Force squad, they did not conduct postmortem of slain leader and they even ordered to sanitise the crime scene just after 100 minutes of her death.
The court took up the appeal of Sehba Musharraf against the confiscation of Pervaiz Musharraf’s properties in this case and adjourned the hearing till October 22 due to prosecution lawyer’s engagements. Benazir Bhutto was killed in a gun and suicide bomb attack after an election rally in Rawalpindi on December 27, 2007, weeks after she returned to Pakistan after years in self-imposed exile.
ATC rejects acquittal plea of top police officials in BB case
