LAHORE - A division bench of the Lahore High Court on Wednesday dismissed appeals of 13 convicts awarded death sentence and life-imprisonment for lynching two brothers in Sialkot district back in 2010.
The court also acquitted nine police officials, giving them benefit of doubt.
At the outset of hearing, a former district police officer Waqar Chohan appeared in the court and said that police officers were not present there where the unfortunate incident took place but despite that they were implicated in the case.
He said a trial court sent every police officer to jail on three-year imprisonment along with fine.  The officers who were convicted in the case included SHO Rana Ilyas, ASI Waris and constables Tariq Mahmood, Muhammad Akram, Mubarak Ali, M Yasin, M Bashir, and Naseer Ahmed.
The other convicts, however, pleaded the court that they had nothing to do with the lynching of two brothers but they were awarded death sentence and life imprisonment after the media pressure. A prosecutor told the bench that the convictwere identified through a video footage and he produced that video before the bench.
After hearing the arguments of both sides, the bench acquitted nine-police officials and dismissed the appeal of others convicts.
On August 15, 2010, hundreds of people gathered in broad daylight in Buttran Wali, Sialkot, as Mughees and Muneeb were lynched. The dead bodies of the two brothers were dragged through the streets by the mob, who labelled them  robbers.
The bodies were then hanged against a water tank. The villagers were about to set the bodies on fire when family members of brothers reached the spot and took them home. Later, no police record was found of Mughees and Muneeb, who were both students.
Man gets 28 years sentence for assisting terrorists
A special anti-terrorism court on Wednesday awarded 28-year imprisonment to a man involved in supplying explosive material and weapons to terrorists.
The court also ordered confiscation of his property. Lower Mall police had arrested Muhammad Tariq on a tip-off with a recovery of explosive material and weapons.
The suspect through his counsel denied the charges and stated that the police implicated him in the case intentionally. However, the court sent him to jail for 28-year imprisonment.