Fatal shooting disguised as road accident exposed in Jammu; 3 cops suspended

Three policemen were suspended after a probe into the death of a woman here last month revealed that she died of gunshot wounds and not in a road accident, an officer said on Saturday.

On August 21, Mehjabeen Akil Sheikh, 30, a resident of Mumbai, her sister Fatima, 21, and Jaspreet Kour, 28, of Ludhiana were brought to a private nursing home on the outskirts of Jammu by two men, who claimed that they had sustained injuries in a road accident on the Ring road.

On August 29, Mehjabeen Sheikh succumbed at Government Medical College (GMC) Hospital.

A probe, however, revealed that the three had been fired upon by unidentified persons and were not injured in a road accident.

In an order issued on Friday, Jammu SSP Joginder Singh suspended Channi Himmat police station SHO, Inspector Deepak Pathania, Sainik Colony police post in-charge, Sub-inspector Wasim Bhatti, and Sub-inspector Rohit Sharma posted at the Channi police station.

The investigation is on to arrest the shooters, police said.

According to a police spokesperson, on August 21, a team from the Channi Himmat police station responded to a call from JK Medicity Hospital regarding three injured people being admitted there.

The investigation officer was informed that the accident had happened on the Ring road, and the doctors declared the injured not fit to record their statement, the spokesperson said.

The next morning, he said, the injured were admitted to Jammu’s GMC hospital without the knowledge of police.

On August 29, the mother of the deceased approached Jammu district magistrate’s office for exemption of the postmortem examination. The application landed at Channi Himmat, duly marked by Additional Deputy Commissioner, the spokesperson said.

He said Inspector Deepak Pathania found the mother’s replies suspicious and contradictory and refused to grant the exemption.

Pathania deputed a team to verify the matter and it was found that the case was registered at GMC as an RTA (Road Traffic Accident) at the Ring road near Zamindara, and a message in the matter had been flashed to the Bari Brahmana police station by the hospital.

Also revealed was that the deceased was admitted on August 22, and not two days earlier as claimed by her mother, the spokesperson said.

On August 30, police ordered inquest proceedings under Section 194 of the BNSS.

The next day, at the order of the ADC, a postmortem examination was conducted in the presence of an executive magistrate and the exercise was videographed, the spokesperson said.

As evidence, police seized the woman’s clothes and retrieved CCTV footage, call detail records, and internet activity of the victims.

“... during the inquiry it surfaced that there was a use of a firearm which led to the injuries and subsequent death of the deceased … Inquest proceedings were converted into an FIR under various sections of the BNS and Arms Act at the Channi Himmat police station,” the spokesperson said.