Woman dies in police custody

A mother of two died several hours after she was picked up from home by Detective Branch of police in Gazipur on Tuesday night.

40-year-old Yasmin Begum's son said he saw multiple injury marks on her body. However, a doctor at the hospital, where she died, said there was none. 

Her 17-year-old-son Yasin Arafat Jisan said about 4-5 men in plain clothes, who introduced themselves as DB officers, showed up at their home in Bhawal in the evening and said they were looking for his father Abdul Hai over allegations of drug dealing against him.

When he and his mother told the men that Abdul was not at home, they started beating her up and took her into custody, he told The Daily Star.

Jisan said his sister, aged around 12, was at home at the time.

Around 11:00pm, Jisan received a phone call from someone who told him that his mother had fallen ill and had been taken to Gazipur Shaheed Tajuddin Ahmed Medical College Hospital.

Due to difficulties in finding transport, he reached the hospital around 1:00am yesterday and saw that her mother had died.

There were injury marks on her legs, arms and some other parts of the body, Jisan said.

Meanwhile, Deputy Commissioner Manjur Rahman of DB in Gazipur told The Daily Star yesterday that Yasmin was arrested with 120 yaba pills and taken to the DB office in the city. She later fell sick and was taken to hospital.

Her family members were arrested with drugs several times before, he added.

Jisan said his father was a drug addict and only came home once or twice a week, but he was not accused in any case.

He added that the officers did not find yaba pills in his mother's possession.

The hospital's Residential Medical Officer Rafiqul Islam said Yasmin was brought to the hospital around 10:00pm with chest pain and breathing difficulties. She was referred to the National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases, but she died about an hour later.

It was primarily suspected that she died due to cardiac arrest, but there were no injury marks on the body, he said.

The cause of death will be known after the autopsy report is prepared, he added.

The body was handed over to the family around 2:00pm yesterday after an autopsy at the hospital.

Jisan said he will file a case.

A three-member committee led by Md Azad Mia, additional commissioner of police in Gazipur, was formed yesterday to investigate the incident, said Gazipur Metropolitan Police Commissioner Anwar Hossain.

The committee was asked to submit the probe report in seven working days.