Cops await DNA report to confirm whether prayer caller was sole culprit
The results from a DNA test of visceral samples will play a decisive role in the probe of the assault and murder of a seven-year-old boy in Lahore earlier this week, police authorities have revealed.
The minor was found murdered in a mosque after being kidnapped and molested in Lahore’s Green Town Area on January 2, after which a video confession of the mosque’s prayer caller went viral on social media.
According to the police, the boy was hanged from a fan on the second floor of the Baitul Karam mosque in Lahore’s Bihari Colony, Green Town. His body was shifted to a morgue for an autopsy. A doctor at the morgue said that after examining the body for post-mortem it was revealed that the boy was sexually assaulted before murder.
The victim’s family expressed anger and staged protests in the aftermath of the gruesome incident, following which seven suspects were detained by the police.
A prayer caller of the Baitul Mukaram mosque is the prime accused in the case, while six others were granted bail by a local court.
In the video, the accused admits to the crime and says, “The devil led me to the gruesome act.”
He said his confession “is an example that the truth can be spoken regardless of the situation”.
“I was not tortured by police. I am giving my confession out of goodness of my heart,” the suspect adds in the video, in which he is flanked by a police officer.
Although police officials have yet to officially confirm the confession, sources in the Lahore police say that before proceeding with the case, the DNA results are awaited to confirm that the prayer caller was the sole culprit.