An accountability court on Saturday sentenced notorious conman Syed Sibt-ul-Hassan Shah Gillani alias Double Shah to 14 years in prison on charges of defrauding his victims out of Rs 441.347 million.
The judge also fined him Rs 3 billion in addition to the prison sentence so that his victims may be returned some of their money. Shah confessed his crime before the judge, however he lashed out at National Accountability Bureau (NAB) authorities in an emotional speech in the court, saying there were around 4,400 witnesses against him in the case but no one had been produced in court by the NAB investigators.
He told the court that that meant his case would have taken decades to be decided had he not confessed. He said he had taken money from people but had not cheated any one. He said he established the “business of masses” and returned their money in his package of double returns. He told the judge that he had returned more than Rs 2 billion to NAB and that he did not want his case to be drawn out, but NAB wanted to prolong the matter.
The judge fixed January 14 as the next date of hearing for Shah’s co-accused Munawar Hussain Gilani, Syed Farhat Hassan, Chan Pir and Shoukat Ali.
NAB Punjab had authorised an investigation against Shah and others on charges of fraud and criminal breach of trust. It found during the investigation that the accused lured and invited the investors to deposit money with them on the promise of returning their deposits with unprecedented profit and to double to their investments after a specified period.