ISLAMABAD (Republic policy) – The Islamabad High Court (IHC) upheld Zahir Jaffar’s death sentence in Noor Muqaddam’s murder case in the verdict it pronounced on Monday.
A two-member bench comprising IHC Chief Justice Aamer Farooq and Justice Sardar Ijaz Ishaq Khan announced the verdict the court had reserved on Dec 21. The court awarded two death counts to the prime suspect, turning the life imprisonment awarded to him into the death penalty.
Earlier, a Sessions Court had sentenced convict Zahir Jaffar to death. While announcing the verdict that was pronounced on Feb 24, Additional Sessions Judge Ata Rabbani also found Zahir guilty of rape under Section 376 and handed him 25 years of imprisonment along with an Rs200,000 fine, and 10 years in jail and a fine of Rs100,000 for kidnapping Noor to murder her. On the other hand, the court also ordered the convict to pay Rs 0.5 million to Noor’s family. The sessions court also sentenced co-accused Jameel and Jan Muhammad to ten years in jail.
Case History
On July 2021, 27-year-old Noor was found murdered at Zahir’s residence located in Islamabad’s Sector F-7/4. A first information report (FIR) under Section 302 (premeditated murder) of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) was lodged against Zahir Jaffer on the complaint of the girl’s father.
Following the FIR, Zahir was arrested; however, on July 24, 2021, his parents and household staff were also taken into custody over allegations of hiding the evidence.
Later, Zahir Jaffer confessed to killing Noor Mukadam and a DNA report confirmed she was raped. The accused said she was betraying him, adding, “I stopped her after knowing about her betrayal, but she denied which made me angry.”
As per the video obtained by the police regarding the torture of the victim, it was seen that Noor ran from the house’s balcony towards the security guard’s cabin and locked herself in at 4:30 pm.
Zahir Jaffer followed Noor and took her out of the cabin. The guards in the street kept watching and did nothing to stop him from assaulting the girl.