Narayanganj man gets death for murdering five members of extended family

A Narayanganj court has sentenced a man to death in the 2016 Narayanganj five-murder case.

The death row convict, Mahfuzur, is the nephew of Shafiqul Islam who lost his wife and two children in the massacre.

On the night of Jan 16, 2016 police found the five bodies on the ground floor of a house in the city.

The dead are Islam's wife Taslima Begum, 40, her son ‘Shanto’, 10, daughter ‘Sumaiya’, 5, brother ‘Morshedul’, 25, and sister-in-law ‘Lamia’, 25.

Mahfuzur, who was arrested the day after the murders, later confessed to them before the court.

He said that he had killed four of the victims with a grinding stone as they slept and bashed another’s head into a wall.

Police pressed charges against Mahfuzur in April that same year.

“Initially, we were sceptical that a single person committed all five murders,” Narayanganj Superintendent of Police Khandker Mohid Uddin told reporters that day. “But, after the investigation and interrogation, we realised that the suspect had used his wits to kill all five.”

On Monday, the district and sessions judge's court ordered five separate death sentences for each of the murders. The convict was also fined by Tk 5,000.

But, according to procedure, only one death sentence will be carried out, said Prosecutor Wazed Ali Khokon.

“Mahfuz committed the murders after his romantic advances on victim Lamia were rejected,” he said.

Shafiqul Islam, the plaintiff in the case, called for the sentence to be carried out quickly.

“He destroyed our entire family,” victim Taslima’s mother Morsheda Begum told the media. “The quicker his sentence is carried out, the happier we will be.”

The decision would be challenged in the higher court once the full verdict is available, said defence counsel Sultan uz Zaman.