Primary accused Usman Mirza. Photo courtesy Islamabad Police
The convicts are also required to pay fines of Rs. 200,000 each
An Islamabad District and Sessions Court on Friday sentenced primary accused Usman Mirza and four others to life imprisonment for harassing and assaulting a couple in the federal capital, and recording the entire incident in a video that leaked on social media last year and provoked mass outrage.
In addition to Mirza, his co-accused Hafiz Ataur Rehman, Adras Qayyum Butt, Mohib Bangash and Farhan Shaheen have also sent to jail for life, while two other accomplices, Umar Bilal and Rehan Hassan Mughal, have been acquitted of all charges.
Announcing the verdict, Additional Sessions Judge Ata Rabbani said the convicts had been sentenced under Section 354-A (assault or use of criminal force to a woman and stripping her of clothing) of the Pakistan Penal Code. They have also been ordered to pay a fine of Rs. 200,000 each, with their sentence to be extended by six months if they are unable to pay it.
Additionally, the convicts have been sentenced to seven years in prison for criminal intimidation (Section 506) and three years for intending to insult the modesty of a woman (Section 509(i)).
The sentences, per the judgment, would run concurrently.
In a posting on Twitter, Information Minister Chaudhry Fawad Hussain welcomed the judgment, noting that the use of technology had enabled the court to render its ruling even after the afflicted couple had retracted their statements against the convicts.
The case surfaced in July 2021 after a video of four people harassing the couple at gunpoint went viral on social media. Filmed a few months earlier, the case made headlines after it emerged that the mobile phones of the accused contained several videos of other couples, each showing them blatantly harassing and threating the victims.
After initially becoming party to the case, the couple whose video went viral retracted their statement in January, with the woman complainant claiming she did not recognize any of the accused and did not wish to pursue the case. Claiming she had never filed any complaint with the police, she alleged that the investigation officer had taken her thumb impressions on blank papers.
The victim’s retraction provoked new outrage, with Pakistanis questioning the quality of justice in the country if video evidence was insufficient to ensure conviction. Parliamentary Secretary for Law Maleeka Bokhari, however, issued a statement shortly after stressing that the state would continue the case and prosecute it on the basis of “irrefutable video and forensic evidence.”
Noting that the video had already been verified by the Pakistan Science Foundation, she said the available evidence was sufficient to ensure conviction even without the support of the victims.