LHC grants post-arrest bail to Canadian scholar in cybercrime case

LAHORE: The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Tuesday granted post-arrest bail to a Canadian national, also a Pakistani PHD scholar, in a cybercrime case.

In late February, the National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency (NCCIA) had registered the case against Hamza Ahmad Khan under the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (Peca) 2016 for allegedly making anti-state posts on social media platforms X and Instagram.

After being denied post-arrest bail by a judicial magistrate and a sessions court, Hamza had approached the LHC for the same.

Taking up the case today, Justice Muhammad Waheed Khan allowed the bail petition, subject to furnishing surety bonds of Rs200,000.

Earlier, Advocate Asad Jamal appeared before the court on behalf of the petitioner and completed his arguments.

The bail petition contended that the sequence of events raised doubts about the legality and transparency of the investigation against the petitioner.

The lawyer argued that the case against the petitioner was false and manufactured with the malicious intent to rope him into unjust and unfair legal proceedings.

He argued that the petitioner had not committed any criminal act under the law and that the case against the petitioner was based on dishonesty and devoid of any merit.

The counsel asserted that the grant of bail is a right and refusal is an exception in such cases, especially when the prosecution is not conclusively equipped with evidence to bring the alleged case against the petitioner.

He asked the court to release the petitioner on bail as there was “no likelihood” that he would tamper with the evidence which has already been collected by the prosecution.

Hamza had arrived in Pakistan to work on his PhD thesis on February 13 and was staying with Rasheed in Phase 10 of Lahore’s Defence Housing Authority (DHA).

The complainant stated that Hamza left the house between 1am and 2am on February 19 after booking a ride to go somewhere and did not return. He said his friends were unable to trace his whereabouts despite searching for him on their own.

Hamza had turned up in NCCIA custody on February 23, a day after a kidnapping case was filed against unidentified suspects over Hamza allegedly going missing.