LAHORE: The US consulate employee who shot dead two citizens here on Thursday was remanded in police custody for six days on Friday. Raymond Davis was produced before a Cantonment area magistrate amid tight security, where he pleaded that he had killed the two youths in self-defence.
“Spotting the armed youths chasing me to rob me of my belongings, I fired at them when they came close to me,” Punjab Deputy Prosecutor General Rana Bakhtiar Ahmed quoted the accused as having said in his statement before the court.
Davis sought permission to contact the US consulate for legal help. He will be produced before the court on Feb 4.
Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah said at a press conference that the government would not give in to any “national or international pressure” in the trial of Davis. The investigation would be conducted on merit, he added.
Urging the federal government not to succumb to pressure, he said the province would ‘strongly resist’ any such move. “The guilty will be punished and the innocent will get justice.”
Mr Sanaullah said that a murder case (FIR No 47 at the Lytton Road police station) had been registered against the US consulate’s employee and investigations would be completed in 14 days.
FO HELP SOUGHT Police have sought the Foreign Office’ help to identify the persons whose car ran over a motorcyclist on Jail Road after Davis shot dead the youths on Thursday.
Officials told Dawn that the Foreign Office was approached after police failed to trace the US consulate employees whose Prado had disappeared after crushing Ibadur Rehman.
“In a letter to the Foreign Office’s deputy chief of protocol, Lahore Capital City Police Officer Aslam Tareen has asked for particulars of the persons occupying the Prado,” an official said.
He added that the CCPO had also informed the FO about the contents of the FIR registered against ‘unidentified’ people occupying the consulate’s vehicle.
The vehicle bore a fake registration number-plate, which was originally issued to a Suzuki Cultus car.
CIA police claimed to have traced criminal record of one of the two youths killed by Davis. SP Umar Virk said that two cellphones recovered from Faizan Haider’s pocket had been snatched in a street crime.
An armed robbery case registered against him with Faisal Town police and another with Gulshan-i-Ravi police had also been traced, he said, adding in the police record Faizan was also known as Umer alias Sanni.
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