SQ Chy’s wife, son and 5 others accused of leaking tribunal verdict

Police have pressed charges against seven in a case over the verdict leak of war crime convict BNP leader Salauddin Quader Chowdhury.

Detective Branch inspector Shahjahan Hossain submitted the Chargesheet at the Dhaka Chief Metropolitan Magistrate’s Court on Thursday.

Charges have been brought against Chowdhury’s wife Farhat Quader Chowdhury, son Hummam Quader Chowdhury, his lawyer Fakhrul Islam, Mehedi Hasan, a staff to lawyer Islam and International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) employees Nayan Ali and Faruk Hossain.

Court Police’s Additional Deputy Commissioner Anisur Rahman said that all of the accused, except the Chowdhury’s wife, son and the lawyer’s assistant Hasan are currently in prison now.

ICT employees Ali and Hossain have confessed to court of being involved in leaking the tribunal verdict.

On Oct 1 last year, SQ Chowdhury, found guilty of crimes against humanity in 1971, was given death sentence by the ICT.

But before the verdict was announced, the BNP leader’s wife and other members of the family showed ‘copies of the verdict’ to journalists, claiming they had found them on the internet.

Amid a furore over the incident, the ICT admitted that the draft of the verdict had indeed been leaked and the tribunal registrar filed a case with police.

On Oct 5, police arrested the accused ICT employees and interrogated them.

On Nov 20, Chowdhury’s lawyer was arrested from his Segunbagicha residence.

According to police, the lawyer’s assistant had induced the two ICT employees to leak part of verdict’s draft in exchange of hefty payments.