SHC rejects Saad Aziz’s appeal against 20-year jail for attempting to kill American educationist

Sindh High Court (SHC) on Friday rejected an appeal of Saad Aziz alias Tin Tin against a 20-year sentence awarded to him by an anti-terrorism court (ATC) for attempting the life of an American educationist Debra Lobo.

A military court had awarded death sentence to Aziz in the Safoora carnage case.

A two-judge bench, headed by Justice Muhammad Karim Khan Agha, said that the appellant had failed to point out any contradictions in the prosecution case.

The SHC bench then rejected Aziz’s appeal and maintained his sentence.

Earlier, the court had provided Aziz with a lawyer at the state’s expense to plead his appeal as he had failed to engage a lawyer on his own.

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Aziz was found guilty of shooting at and wounding veteran American educationist Lobo in April 2015 on Karachi’s Shaheed-i-Millat Road. She was the vice-principal of Jinnah Medical and Dental College at that time.

The ATC-XI judge, who conducted the trial in the judicial complex inside the central prison, had handed down 10-year imprisonment to Aziz for attempted murder under Section 324 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC).

He was also handed down another 10-year imprisonment for committing an “act of terror” punishable under Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997.

According to the prosecution, the American educationist was on her way to her residence in the Defence Housing Authority (DHA) in a car when the attack took place at around 3pm.