The session court of Additional Session Judge Muhammad Atta Rabbani on Wednesday allowed the counsel of Zahir Jaffer, the accused of murder of Noor Muqaddam, to present the evidence in his defence on February 14.
Zahir Jaffer pleading not guilty to the charge of murdering Noor Mukaddam, answered the questions in a 25-point questionnaire handed over to his counsel by a session court. Responding to questions, the accused said that he never abducted Noor but she voluntarily came to his house on July 18, 2021. She was carrying a heavy cache of drugs with her and asked him to throw a drug party at his house, he said, adding that he refused to do so as he was traveling to America next day. Zahir informed the court that Noor enforced him to cancel his ticket, as she wanted to accompany him to America. She called her several friends to arrange the money for buying a ticket, and forcefully returned the taxi via which he would have to reach the airport next day, Jaffer added.
On July 20, Noor Mukaddam had a drug party at his house with her friends and everyone in the party, including Noor and him consumed drugs, Zahir told the court.
He said, he fell unconscious due to the excessive use of drugs and when regained consciousness a few hours later, he found himself tied up in the lounge and after a while uniformed police and people in civilian clothes came and rescued him, Zahir said. When he was rescued, he learned that Noor Mukaddam was killed by any of the participants of the drug party or someone else, the prime accused Zahir Jaffer told the court.
Noor Mukaddam was in a living-relationship with him but they were not in contact for last six months, said Zahir denying the rape charges saying that his DNA report is positive only because he and Noor were in a physical relationship with mutual consent.
To the question of his fingerprints on the pistol’s magazine recovered from the crime scene, he said that the pistol was licensed, that’s why his fingerprints came in the forensic report however he denied that his fingerprints were recovered from the crime scene.
He also explained that his fingerprints were not legally taken by the police in accordance with the law as he was in police custody when his fingerprints were taken and misused for falsely implicating him in the case.
About the CCTV footage, Jaffer said that according to prosecution’s evidence, no DVR was found at the crime scene whereas the IMEI number of Noor’s mobile was different than the IMEI number mentioned in the forensic lab report of her mobile. He also said that his mobile phone was in possession of the investigator after his arrest which was never found later even when he asked about it.
Responding to the question that why the police registered case against him, Jaffer said that since this unfortunate incident happened in his house therefore he and his parents were falsely implicated in this case.
Zahir said that SSP Mustafa Tanveer sharing the details of crime scene with media after the incident had admitted recovery of drugs from the crime scene. He was latter removed and the matter of drugs recovered from Noor’s body was put under the carpet, Zahir added.
