{"id":25115,"date":"2023-11-16T10:13:05","date_gmt":"2023-11-16T10:13:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/sarah-inam-murder-case-evidence-proves-prime-accuseds-guilt-lawyer-argues-in-court\/"},"modified":"2023-11-16T10:13:05","modified_gmt":"2023-11-16T10:13:05","slug":"sarah-inam-murder-case-evidence-proves-prime-accuseds-guilt-lawyer-argues-in-court","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/sarah-inam-murder-case-evidence-proves-prime-accuseds-guilt-lawyer-argues-in-court\/","title":{"rendered":"Sarah Inam murder case: Evidence proves prime accused\u2019s guilt, lawyer argues in court"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div dir=\"auto\">\n<p>An Islamabad district and sessions court was informed on Thursday that all the evidence collected in the Sarah Inam murder case proved that Shahnawaz Amir, the prime accused, was guilty of the crime and should be sentenced to death.<\/p>\n<p>Sarah, a Canadian national, was allegedly murdered by Shahnawaz, her husband and son of renowned journalist Ayaz Amir, in Islamabad a year ago.<\/p>\n<p>Shahnawaz was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1711635\/man-arrested-for-murdering-canadian-national-wife-in-islamabad\">arrested<\/a> on Sept 23 last year at a farmhouse in Islamabad\u2019s Shahzad Town. Sarah was reportedly murdered just a day after she arrived in the country from Dubai where she had been working. The accused was initially <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1711725\">remanded<\/a> to police custody a day after his arrest and the period of his physical remand was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1712669\/sarahs-murderer-given-in-police-custody-for-four-more-days\">extended<\/a> several times.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"media  sm:w-1\/2  w-full  media--right  media--embed  media--uneven\">\n<p>    <iframe class=\"nk-iframe\" onload=\"setInterval(()=&gt;{try{this.style.height=this.contentWindow.document.body.scrollHeight+'px';}catch{}}, 100)\" width=\"100%\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" style=\"height:400px;position:relative\" src=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/card\/1713270\" sandbox=\"allow-same-origin allow-scripts allow-popups allow-modals allow-forms\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p>His father was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1712256\">discharged<\/a> from the case and his mother Sameena Shah, nominated as co-accused in the case, was granted <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1718453\">post-arrest bail<\/a> in November last year.<\/p>\n<p>On December 5, both Shahnawaz and his mother were <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1724814\">indicted<\/a> in the case.<\/p>\n<p>In January, Dr Bushra Ashraf, who conducted Sarah\u2019s post-mortem examination, <a rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"link--external\" href=\"https:\/\/tribune.com.pk\/story\/2396655\/sara-inam-died-of-multiple-head-injuries\">told<\/a> an Islamabad court that the victim had multiple fractures on her head.<\/p>\n<p>In July, Shahnawaz\u2019s lawyer <a rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"link--external\" href=\"https:\/\/www.24newshd.tv\/13-Jul-2023\/father-uncle-cross-examined-in-sara-inam-murder-case\">completed<\/a> the cross-examination of Sarah\u2019s father and her uncle. Her father Inamur Rahim has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1775656\">ruled out any compromise<\/a>, which he has also blamed for delays in the case\u2019s conclusion.<\/p>\n<p>Last month, in Investigation Officer (IO) Habibur Rehman <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1778241\">testimony<\/a>, it was revealed that Shahnawaz had confessed to the crime. Subsequently, the sessions judge had <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1780359\/sara-inam-murder-case-nears-conclusion\">concluded<\/a> recording statements of the IO and the prosecution witnesses in the murder case.<\/p>\n<p>Today, the court heard final arguments from all the parties as the case nears conclusion. Shahnawaz, his mother and Sarah\u2019s father were present during the hearing.<\/p>\n<h2><a id=\"the-hearing\" href=\"#the-hearing\" class=\"heading-permalink\" aria-hidden=\"true\" title=\"Permalink\"\/>The hearing<\/h2>\n<p>At the outset, Rao Abdur Rahim, counsel for Sarah\u2019s father, told Sessions Judge Nasir Javed Rana that a forensic analysis revealed two photos were found in Shahnawaz\u2019s phone, of which one was of the victim. He said it showed Sarah\u2019s body, covered with a white cloth, lying in the room.<\/p>\n<p>The photo, he continued, was also sent through WhatsApp. He did not mention to whom it was sent.<\/p>\n<p>He noted that Shahnawaz had said, during his testimony, that there was no disagreement between the accused and the victim. \u201cWe have found a document from the accused\u2019s mobile phone which is dated prior to Sarah\u2019s arrival in Pakistan,\u201d he said, adding that testimonies could lie but documents could not.<\/p>\n<p>The lawyer stated that there were only three people in the house at the time of the murder \u2014 Shahnawaz, his mother and Sarah. \u201cThe victim\u2019s phone was destroyed when she reached the accused\u2019s house. She was at his mercy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Rao further said that the postmortem report showed there were bruises on Sarah\u2019s body, her bones were broken and all these injuries were inflicted while the victim was still alive. \u201cHow is it possible that Samina Shah didn\u2019t hear a thing while Sarah was tortured to this extent?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n<p>The lawyer also highlighted that the accused had said he didn\u2019t divorce Sarah, but his phone record showed otherwise. Moreover, the DVR at Shahnawaz\u2019s house was removed just two days before the crime, he added.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"media  sm:w-1\/2  w-full  media--right  media--embed  media--uneven\">\n<p>    <iframe class=\"nk-iframe\" onload=\"setInterval(()=&gt;{try{this.style.height=this.contentWindow.document.body.scrollHeight+'px';}catch{}}, 100)\" width=\"100%\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" style=\"height:400px;position:relative\" src=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/card\/1756835\" sandbox=\"allow-same-origin allow-scripts allow-popups allow-modals allow-forms\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p>\u201cAll this evidence proves Shahnawaz\u2019s crime,\u201d Rao asserted and compared the murder with the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1636267\/ex-diplomats-daughter-killed\">Noor Mukadam case<\/a>. He then pleaded to the court to hand the death penalty to the accused and concluded the arguments.<\/p>\n<p>Subsequently, Prosecutor Rana Hassan Abbas came to the rostrum. He said the incident was neither reported by the police nor the accused.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe victim was an educated and talented woman,\u201d he told the court, recalling that Sarah married Shahnawaz last year.<\/p>\n<p>According to the evidence collected from the accused\u2019s mobile phone, Sarah called Shahnawaz on Sept 18 \u2014 five days before her alleged murder \u2014 the prosecutor said and read out loud the transcript of the conversation. \u201cThe accused blocked Sarah multiple times and even threatened her,\u201d he said, adding that the victim was just requesting that her parents be given a chance to see her off in an honourable way.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThree messages in this chat were deleted that were possibly related to divorce,\u201d prosecutor Abbas stated. The last message sent by Shahnawaz was on Sept 20 after which Sarah landed in Pakistan on Sept 22 and stayed with the accused.<\/p>\n<p>On the day of the murder, he continued, Samina Baig told the police that her son committed the murder after which evidence \u2014 including the murder weapon \u2014 was collected from the crime scene. \u201cShahnawaz\u2019s DNA was found from the injuries on Sarah\u2019s body,\u201d Abbas said, adding that the accused\u2019s clothes were smeared with blood.<\/p>\n<p>He added that passports and mobile phones were also seized.<\/p>\n<p>Here, Judge Rana asked the prosecutor how much more time he would need, to which Abbas replied 20 minutes. The judge, however, said he had a meeting to attend and adjourned the hearing till Monday (Nov 20).<\/p>\n<h2><a id=\"the-case\" href=\"#the-case\" class=\"heading-permalink\" aria-hidden=\"true\" title=\"Permalink\"\/>The case<\/h2>\n<p>In September, the police become a complainant in the case, with a first information report (FIR) registered for the murder on the complaint of Shahzad Town Station House Officer (SHO) Nawazish Ali Khan at the Chak Shahzad police station, initially under Section 302 (punishment for murder) of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC).<\/p>\n<p>Later, police added Section 109 (punishment for abetment if the act abetted is committed in consequence and where no express provision is made for its punishment) of the PPC to the FIR and initiated proceedings against Shahnawaz\u2019s parents, Sameena and senior journalist Ayaz Amir.<\/p>\n<p>The development came after Sarah\u2019s uncle filed an application with police, alleging that Shahnawaz had murdered Sarah in connivance with his parents.<\/p>\n<p>According to the FIR, the SHO was present on Park Road near Chatha Bakhtawar when he got the information about the murder.<\/p>\n<p>The FIR stated that when the police team reached the farmhouse where the murder had taken place, they were received by the mother of the main suspect who told them that her son had \u201cmurdered his wife during a scuffle\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>As per the FIR, she informed the police that her son was still present in the house. The police managed to enter the house and detained the suspect, it claimed, adding that the suspect\u2019s hands were \u201csoaked in blood\u201d at the time of the arrest.<\/p>\n<p>During the inquiry, the man identified himself as Shahnawaz Amir and told the police that he had murdered his wife with a dumbbell and hid her body in a bathtub in the bathroom, it claimed.<\/p>\n<p>Police recovered the dead body on his information, the FIR said, adding that a wound was found on the head of the deceased. The police team also recovered the murder weapon from the house which was \u201chidden under a bed\u201d, it added.<\/p>\n<p>Subsequently, the body was moved to the Poly Clinic for autopsy and the murder weapon and Shahnawaz\u2019s shirt were sent for a forensic audit.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An Islamabad district and sessions court was informed on Thursday that all the evidence collected in the Sarah Inam murder case proved that Shahnawaz Amir, the prime accused, was guilty of the crime and should be sentenced to death. Sarah, a Canadian national, was allegedly murdered by Shahnawaz, her husband and son of renowned journalist [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25116,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.dawn.com\/large\/2023\/11\/16141703503f725.png?r=143011","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pakistan"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}