By Adnan Rafique
ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court of Pakistan has issued a detailed judgment in the kidnapping and murder case of five-year-old Umar Rathore, commuting the death sentences of three convicts to life imprisonment.
The apex court also dismissed an appeal challenging the acquittal of co-accused Asad Mumtaz.
Justice Ishtiaq Ibrahim authored the detailed verdict, observing that the prosecution had established the case through circumstantial evidence and a chain of incriminating circumstances rather than direct eyewitness testimony.
However, the court held that certain doubts in the record did not satisfy the legal threshold required to sustain the death penalty.
According to the judgment, the Supreme Court converted the death sentences of Aftab Zafar, Hamza Jahangir and Muhammad Yasir into life imprisonment. The court also directed the three convicts to pay compensation of Rs500,000 each to the legal heirs of the deceased child.
The court observed that the remaining doubt in the prosecution case entitled the accused to the benefit of doubt to the extent of the sentence, resulting in the conversion of capital punishment into life imprisonment.
According to the detailed judgment, Umar Rathore was abducted on December 21, 2019, from the jurisdiction of Bahara Kahu police station.
The prosecution maintained that the child had been confined in a rented house belonging to convict Aftab Zafar for the purpose of demanding ransom.
The court noted that due to increasing police searches and the child’s crying, the accused decided to kill him. On December 24, 2019, the child’s body was recovered from a wooden cupboard, with his hands and feet bound with tape.
The judgment further stated that the Punjab Forensic Science Agency confirmed the DNA of the convicts from cigarette butts recovered from the crime scene, while the National Forensic Science Agency reported that fingerprints of Aftab Zafar, Hamza Jahangir and Muhammad Yasir were found on glass objects recovered from the premises.
The court also observed that the landlady testified that the lower portion of the house had been rented out to Aftab Zafar for Rs12,000 per month.
The Supreme Court held that although the prosecution had successfully established the guilt of the accused through circumstantial evidence, the degree of certainty required for maintaining the death penalty was not available on record, warranting the conversion of the sentences into life imprisonment.
