The Supreme Court sharply criticised Pakistan’s criminal justice system in a newly released judgement written by former judge Athar Minallah. He said investigations and prosecutions suffer from poor integrity and weak professionalism. He also noted major inconsistencies in the case record and said the investigating officers failed in their legal duties.
The case involved the 2016 murders of two teenagers in Chitral. The complainant accused eight people of abduction, but police recorded the report in the daily diary instead of registering it properly. Later, the prosecution relied heavily on judicial confessions even though the complainant’s statements changed between the complaint and the trial. These issues raised serious doubts about the investigation.
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Justice Minallah questioned the reliability of the judicial confessions, which formed the core of the prosecution’s argument. He said delays in recording these confessions while the accused were in police custody weakened their credibility. He also stressed that such confessions must be voluntary and supported by independent evidence before they can justify a conviction.
The judgement noted that the case was entirely based on circumstantial evidence. There was no direct witness linking the accused to the crime. Because of these gaps, the arrests lacked legal justification, and the confessions carried serious doubts. The court found that the prosecution failed to meet basic legal standards.
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In the end, the Supreme Court ruled that the appellants deserved the benefit of doubt under the weak criminal justice system. It held that they could not be convicted on unreliable evidence. The ruling highlighted deep flaws in Pakistan’s investigative and prosecutorial practices and reinforced the need for urgent reforms in the criminal justice system.