KARACHI: Police on Saturday informed a court that suspects who gang-raped a young woman in a moving train also filmed the entire episode to blackmail the victim.

The investigating officer of the case, Inspector Habibullah Khattak, submitted this before Judicial Magistrate (South) Shahnawaz in a progress report.

The Railway police had arrested five staffers of the privately managed Bahaudin Zakria Express for allegedly sexually assaulting a 25-year-old victim on May 27.

On Saturday, the IO produced the suspects in court on expiry of their physical remand and sought an extension in the same.

He submitted that during the course of interrogation it had emerged that the suspects had not only raped the victim on turns but they also filmed the immoral incident in a bid to blackmail her so that she could not narrate the whole episode to anyone.

The IO added that the cell phones of all the five detained suspects had to be recovered to retrieve the footage and send the same to a forensic laboratory for its analysis to determine the authenticity.

He said that the uniforms of the suspect, which they worn on the day of the incident, were also to be recovered, as they had hidden the same somewhere.

He requested the magistrate to extend the physical remand of the suspects in police custody.

Granting the request, the judge extended their physical remand by two days, directing the IO to produce them on the next date along with an investigation report.

On the last date, the victim had identified two of the five detained staffers as those who had subjected her to a sexual assault and also facilitated their accomplices in this act.

A case was registered under Sections 377 (punishment for rape) and 34 (common intent) of the Pakistan Penal Code at the PR City Police Station on the complaint of the victim.

Published in Dawn, June 12th, 2022