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ISLAMABAD: Noor Mukadam’s murderer has filed 23 appeals against his conviction.
Zahir Jaffer appealed the Islamabad High Court’s (IHC) decision to sustain his trial court’s conviction in the murder case.
On April 12, he filed an appeal in the Supreme Court through his counsel, Barrister Salman Safdar, which has yet to be heard by the apex court’s bench.
In his appeal, he stated that the IHC division bench’s decision was erroneous for 23 reasons.
Last month, the IHC division bench, led by Chief Justice Aamer Farooq, confirmed Jaffer’s death sentence.
It challenged the conviction, alleging that the case was handled “differently” than other cases.
It stated that the evidence against him was “weak and incomplete,” that the prosecution “failed to bring on record solid, concrete evidence,” that the charge was not proven “beyond a reasonable doubt,” that the First Information Report (FIR) was filed late, that it contained “hearsay evidence,” that a key witness was introduced for a “cover-up,” that the prosecution misused the supplementary statement, and that there were several gaps in the case. The courts did not analyze the electronic evidence in conformity with the law and the Supreme Court’s ruling.
The appellant also questioned doctors’ “piecemeal” approach in conducting Noor Mukadam’s autopsy. Zahir Jaffer’s mental health was not thoroughly investigated, and the convict was not reported to the medical board. Despite the fact that a little Swiss knife was used to behead the deceased, the defendant was wrongfully charged with rape and was not granted the benefit of the doubt. The convict was not granted a fair trial, and the criminal investigation and judicial proceedings were affected by media hype.
On February 24, 2022, an Islamabad sessions court condemned Zahir to death and sentenced two co-accused, Mohammad Iftikhar and Jan Mohammad, to ten years in prison.
Zahir’s parents, Zakir Jaffar and Asmat Adamji, as well as TherapyWorks personnel, were indicted in October 2021 by a district and sessions court but were later acquitted when Zahir was convicted.
Following the decision, Zahir filed an appeal with the International Court of Justice in March 2022, disputing his death sentence. The IHC, however, not only upheld the death sentence last month but also transformed Zahir’s 25-year prison sentence into another death penalty.
