DHAKA, Aug 17, 2023 (BSS) - A Dhaka court today convicted and sentenced five people including journalist Shafik Rehman and daily Amar Desh Editor Mahmudur Rahman to seven-year imprisonment in a case for plotting to abduct and murder Prime Minister's Information and Communication Technology Affairs Adviser Sajeeb Wazed Joy in the US in 2015.

The other convicts in the case are: Jatiyatabadi Samajik Sangskritik Sangstha (Jasas) vice-president Mohammad Ullah Mamun, his son Rizvi Ahmed Caesar and Mizanur Rahman Bhuiyan, an expat businessman living in the US.

Dhaka Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Asaduzzaman Nur pronounced the judgment, sentencing the five to five-year jail for an attempt to abduct Joy and two-year more for the charge of plotting to kill him.

Both the sentences of jail, however, will run concurrently.

According to the case documents, the convicts held meetings on different occasions in Jasas Noya Paltan office in Dhaka, in the United Kingdom and the United States to make plots in this regard.

Police on August 3, 2015, filed the case with Paltan Police Station and on February 19, 2018, filed charge-sheet against the five. 

A total of 12 witnesses including Joy testified in the case on different hearing dates.