Man accused of killing woman, three children killed in Karachi police ‘encounter’

KARACHI: A man accused of killing a woman and her three children in Karachi’s Surjani Town was killed in an alleged police encounter on Friday, a day after investigators said they had arrested him and obtained a confession to the crime.

The suspect was killed when a police team took him to recover the alleged murder weapon from a drain, according to police officials.

West DIG Irfan Baloch had said on Thursday that investigators identified the suspect through eyewitness accounts, mobile data and other technical evidence. He had allegedly confessed to killing the woman and her three children during interrogation.

Police said the suspect had been taken to the location based on information that he had thrown the alleged murder weapon into a drain. During the recovery operation, he allegedly snatched a police officer’s pistol and opened fire.

One police official was wounded in the firing, after which other officers returned fire and killed the suspect at the scene, police said. The man had allegedly killed a woman and her three children at their home in Sector 7-D, Surjani Town, earlier this week.

Police say suspect planned attack

The killings came to light on Monday night when the woman’s husband returned home from work and discovered the bodies inside the house.

According to the woman’s brother, the husband, who worked as an electrician at a shopping centre on Rashid Minhas Road, found the house dark. After switching on the lights, he discovered the blood-soaked bodies of his wife and two children.

A third child was found critically injured and was later taken to Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC), where the child succumbed to the injuries. The husband alerted his brother-in-law and other relatives by telephone before calling the police emergency helpline 15.

A case was registered on Tuesday on the complaint of the children’s grandfather, Muhammad Yameen, under Sections 302 (premeditated murder) and 34 (common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code against unidentified suspects.

DIG Baloch said investigators believed the attack had been planned and that the suspect had attempted to make the killings appear to be a robbery.

According to police, the suspect switched off his mobile phone before approaching the house and did not use his motorcycle. Instead, he travelled by a Qingqi rickshaw, got off at a particular location and walked to the victims’ home.

Once inside, he allegedly took clothes out of a cupboard and broke open a children’s money-saving box to create the impression that the house had been burgled. Investigators, however, concluded early in the probe that the incident was a targeted killing rather than a robbery, Baloch said.

Police Surgeon Dr Summaiya Syed had earlier said all four victims suffered multiple severe injuries to the head and brain, with the blows causing extensive damage to their brain tissues.

Eyewitness accounts lead to arrest

Baloch said police identified the suspect after questioning residents and examining technical evidence.

A woman whose husband worked as a security guard told investigators that she was friends with the victim and had visited the house at around 1am or 1:30am. She reportedly told police that only one man had entered the house.

Another witness told investigators that he had greeted the suspect while the man was leaving the area after the killings.

“These two things” made the suspect the prime suspect, Baloch said, adding that police subsequently analysed his mobile data and other evidence to identify him as the alleged perpetrator.

The DIG said no other person had so far been found to be involved in the killings.

Police also said they had found no evidence of a prior relationship between the suspect and the woman. According to Baloch, the woman had resisted during the attack, which investigators considered inconsistent with the suggestion that the two had been in a relationship.

The DIG had earlier said the suspect was the husband of the victims’ paternal aunt and had gone to their house in the absence of the children’s father. According to police, the suspect first attacked the woman after she resisted and then killed the three children.

Murder weapon, phone remain missing

Before his death in the encounter, the suspect had reportedly told investigators that he threw the alleged murder weapon into a drain.

Police said teams were searching the drain to recover the weapon when the encounter took place.

The suspect’s mobile phone had also not been recovered. Police believed it might have been picked up by someone among the estimated 2,000 to 2,500 people who gathered at the crime scene before officers arrived.

Investigators were looking into the disappearance of the phone, officials said. Police said the suspect’s death in the encounter brought the investigation into a new phase, with efforts continuing to recover the alleged murder weapon and establish the complete circumstances surrounding the killings.

The police account of the encounter, including the claim that the suspect snatched an officer’s pistol and opened fire, had not been independently verified.