LAHORE: The Lahore High Court (LHC) Tuesday quashed a life sentence to a woman charged with killing her 7-month old niece.
Hearing the appeal in the matter on Tuesday, a single-member bench of the LHC comprising Justice Muhammad Amjad Rafique turned down the conviction that trial court awarded to the accused person saying conviction was awarded on the insufficient evidence.
Another ground the Justice Rafique noted down in his verdict was that a delay of seven hours was found in the registration of the First Information Report saying no reason was given for such delay.
“The prosecution failed to take the cot and other concerned items in its possession”. “The police had not found traces of blood from the crime scene. The post-mortem was not reported in the FIR. The failure in describing the post-mortem is a major flaw in the case,” the judge pointed out in the decision saying, “The post-mortem of the child was conducted nine hours after the incident.”
Justice Rafique said in its verdict that the prosecution claimed the child was killed with an iron rod, while the post-mortem report disclosed that the girl was thrown from the first floor of the building. He further said that the prosecution failed to produce the mother of the child.
It is pertinent to mention that the trial court awarded life sentence and Rs0.1 million fine to the accused lady.
The court said in its decision that the accused woman had a land dispute with her brother due to which they were involved in water distribution dispute, adding that the accused and her brother were also engaged in scuffle, which distressed the accused. The prosecution produced five witnesses against the accused. “The woman however stated that she was being entrapped in the case to take her landed property, the judge observed”.
