4 to hang, 5 get life

A Chittagong court on Sunday handed down death sentence to four people and awarded life in prison to five more for the murder of the mother of a government law officer.

Third Additional District and Sessions Judge La Mong gave the verdict in the afternoon.

The plaintiff’s lawyer Md Khorshedul Alam told bdnews24.com the judge read out the verdict after hearing 38 witnesses. He also acquitted four people.

Chemon Ara Khatun, 58, mother of Chittagong Metropolitan Court’s Public Prosecutor Nazrul Islam Sentu, was murdered on Nov 10, 2009, at Chandanaish Upazila in Chittagong.

Those who were awarded death penalty are – Abu Mokarram, Shah Alam, Johra Khatun and Shahidul Islam Shahed. All of them were present in court when the verdict was delivered.

Md Arif, Mintu Das, Md Yunus, Jahangir Alam and Saiful Islam were given life in jail. Of them, only Yunus and Saiful are behind bars and the three others are on the run.

Case details say local healer Abu Mokarram and his associates managed to swindle a huge amount of money and gold jewellery from Chemon Ara. But as she came to understand what happened, she asked them to return the money and jewellery and threatened them saying she will tell her son everything about their fraud.

Then the accused had called and took her out on Nov 10, 2009. Her body was found on the following day in a swamp near the BG Trust University at Chandanaish Upazila.

Her son Sentu filed the murder case at the Chandanaish Police Station on the following day naming seven people.

Police submitted chargesheet against 13 people on Aug 7 in 2010. The court also framed charges against the accused on Oct 18 same year.

The case details read that Shah Alam and Johra Khatun were also neighbours of Chemon Ara Khatun.

Source: Bd news24