No bar to release SQ Chy's lawyer Fakhrul

Staff Correspondent: The Appellate Division of the Supreme Court (SC) upheld the High Court (HC) order that granted bail to Barrister AKM Fakhrul Islam, a lawyer for executed war criminal Salauddin Quader Chowdhury, for one year in a case filed for leaking draft of Salauddin's verdict a day before a tribunal delivered the judgment.

Now, there is no legal bar to Fakhrul's release from jail, his lawyers said.

A four-member Appellate Division bench led by Chief Justice Surendra Kumar Sinha passed the order at 11:00am on Tuesday after rejecting the petition filed by the government, seeking stay order on the bail of Fakhrul.

Advocate Zainul Abedin and Barrister Mahbub Uddin Khokon stood for Fakhrul while Attorney General Mahbubey Alam represented the government in the court.

Earlier on April 4, the High Court granted bail to Barrister AKM Fakhrul Islam for one year in the case filed for leaking draft of Salauddin's verdict.

Soon after the pronouncement of the verdict in the war crimes case on October 1, 2013, Salauddin's wife and family members showed “a copy of the verdict” to newsmen, claiming that it was leaked before. Later, the tribunal authorities said a portion of the draft verdict was leaked.

Detectives filed a case with Shahbagh Police Station on October 4 that year against Fakhrul, his assistant Mehedi Hasan, the then office assistant of the tribunal Faruk Hossain and peon Nayon Ali and several unnamed people under the Information and Communication Technology Act, 2006.

Fakhrul was sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment and fined Tk 10 lakh on last September 15 in the case filed for leaking draft of Salauddin's verdict.

risingbd/DHAKA/Apr 11, 2017/Mehedi/Amirul