Hasan Arafat, senior assistant commissioner of the Detective Branch of police, submitted the chargesheet to the chief metropolitan magistrate’s court on Tuesday.
“The documents were kept at the special room of the magistrate for observation. Police received them on Thursday,” said Sub-Inspector Jalal, registration officer of court police.
The five accused are Shafik Rehman, former editor of weekly magazine Jai Jai Din, Mahmudur Rahman, acting editor of Bangla daily Amar Desh, Mohammad Ullah Mamun, vice-president of Jatiyatabadi Samajik Sangskritik Sangstha, a pro-BNP organisation, his son Rizve Ahmed Caesar, and Mizanur Rahman Bhuiyan, an businessman living in the United States.
Mamun and Mizanur have been shown as fugitives in the chargesheet.
Shafik and Mahmudur were the key conspirators in the abduction plot, SI Jalal said citing the chargesheet.
Mohammad Ullah Mamun aided the conspiracy. A former vice-president of the US unit of the BNP, Mamun now lives in Connecticut.
Police have accused Mizanur Rahman of funding the crime and working as an adviser.
Similar accounts are mentioned in a New Court document that handed a three-year jail term to Rizve in 2015 after founding him guilty of bribing an FBI official to obtain classified information.
As per the court document, he handed the information to a Bangladeshi journalist in return for $30,000.
The matter had triggered discussions in Bangladesh parliament. Joy, who lives in Virginia with his family, accused BNP leaders of conspiring to ‘abduct and kill him’ in a Facebook post in March that year.
Bangladesh police started the case at Paltan Police Station in August 2015 over the “plot to abduct Joy”.
Shafik Rehman was shown arrested in the case in April 2016. The journalist, known for his pro-BNP stance, was taken on remand twice that year.
Police found classified information and documents on Joy after raiding his home in Dhaka’s Iskaton, the DB had said.
Shafik collected the data for writing an investigative report, his wife Taleya Rehman claimed.
Shafik secured bail from the Supreme Court after spending five months in jail.
“Mahmudur Rahman collected information like, the places he (Joy) visits, his work station, his family members etc from Miltan (Caesar’s friend Mizanur Rahman Bhuiyan). Such information are enough to plot an abduction,” DMP Additional Commissioner Monirul Islam had said then.
Caesar used his friend Mizanur Rahman Bhuiyan to pass on the information to Mahmudur.
Mahmudur secured bail in November 2016 after spending three years behind bars.