Zubair Qureshi
Defence lawyers in the Noor Mukadam murder case Wednesday completed the cross-examination of the prosecution witnesses.
The trial court will now hand over a questionnaire to all suspects to record their individual statements.
Mukadam, a former Pakistani diplomat’s daughter, was found beheaded in Islamabad’s posh F-7/4 neighborhood on July 20 last year.
The murder sparked public outrage and grabbed media attention unlike any other recent crime against women.
The key suspect Zahir Jaffer was arrested from the crime scene on the day of the murder and has since been in Rawalpindi’s Adiala Jail.
Others charged in the case include Jaffer’s parents, Zakir Jaffer and Asmat Adamjee, their three house-hold staff, Iftikhar, Jan Muhammad and Jameel, and six employees of Therapy Works, a counseling cen-ter from where Jaffer had received certification to become a therapist and where he had been receiving treatment in the weeks leading up to the murder.
The case is now in the concluding stage in Islama-bad’s district court, where additional sessions judge Atta Rabbani has been conducting its hearings.
A lengthy process of the recording statements of witnesses before their cross-examination by defence attorneys concluded during Wednesday’s hearing.
The cross-examination process allows defendants or their lawyers to question witnesses along with offi-cials involved in the investigation of a criminal matter to expose weaknesses in the prosecution’s case.
