Pakistan officers suspended over UK boy kidnap

Four police officers in Pakistan have been suspended over the handling of the kidnap of a five-year-old British boy.

Sahil Saeed, from Oldham, was snatched by armed robbers on Wednesday while visiting relatives with his father.

But the police did not initially respond to the family’s emergency call to “Rescue 15”, the Pakistani equivalent of 999.

Pakistan Interior Minister Rehman Malik met Sahil’s father and said he planned to “make an example of” the captors.

Sahil was taken from his grandmother’s home in the Punjab city of Jhelum as he prepared to take a taxi to the airport for his return flight to the UK.

The attackers are said to have demanded a £100,000 ransom for his return.

‘Pray for him’

On Saturday, Sahil’s mother Akila Naqqas pleaded for his safe return, saying she would forgive his son’s captors if they released him.

Sahil Saeed was taken by robbers after a raid on his grandmother’s home

She also said Sahil had never been apart from either herself or her husband.

“It’s just a nightmare. I’m not sleeping at all,” she said. “It’s worse at night when I have no-one to comfort me.

“All we can do is just pray for him.”

It is understood several men, including a taxi driver, have been arrested in Pakistan.

The interior minister visited Sahil ‘s father Raja Saeed in Jhelum on Sunday.

Mr Malik told him the police believed the kidnappers were people close to the family, and that they were closing in on the culprits.

“We have certain leads that I would not like to discuss,” he said. “But a warning to those abductors – leave the boy because we are very near to you.”

He also said the kidnap was “humiliating” for Pakistan and the captors would be made an “example off”.

OJ Simpson convicted of robbery

OJ Simpson has been found guilty on 12 charges of armed robbery, conspiracy to kidnap and assault with a deadly weapon by a court in the US city of Las Vegas.

The former US football star and actor was accused of robbing two sports memorabilia dealers a year ago.

The armed robbery charges carry a mandatory jail sentence, and kidnapping carries a possible life term.

Simpson, 61, who denied the charges, was acquitted of murder in 1995 in what was dubbed “the trial of the century”.

CHARGES AGAINST OJ SIMPSON Conspiracy to commit a crime: guilty Conspiracy to kidnap: guilty Two counts of first degree kidnapping: guilty Burglary in possession of a deadly weapon: guilty Two counts of armed robbery: guilty Two counts of assault with a deadly weapon: guilty Two counts of coercion with use of a deadly weapon: guilty

The charges in the latest trial centred on an incident in the Palace Station hotel in Las Vegas in September 2007.

Simpson was accused – and convicted – of kidnapping two sports memorabilia dealers and holding them in the hotel.

The former National Football League running back seized the pair in an attempt to reclaim items in their possession related to his sporting career, which Simpson claimed still belonged to him.

Handcuffed

Asked by reporters on his way into court for the latest verdict, which was read late on Friday night local time, Simpson said he was prepared for the judgement.

“You gotta be ready,” the former Buffalo Bills star running back told journalists.

Inside the court both Simpson and his accomplice, Clarence Steward, were found guilty on all charges by the Las Vegas jury.

Simpson blew out his cheeks and nodded as the verdicts were read out.

He was then led away with his hands cuffed by police. He will be sentenced in December.

The judge refused to grant him bail pending sentencing.

In his previous trial, Simpson was accused of murdering his former wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman in 1994.

The not-guilty verdict came 13 years to the day before his conviction in Las Vegas, and shocked many in America.

Mr Simpson was later found liable for the deaths in a civil case and ordered to pay $33.5m (£19m) to Mr Goldman’s family.

FBI identifies US kidnap accused

Christian Gerhartsreiter, aka Clark Rockefeller, faces a number of charges

The FBI has used fingerprint testing to confirm the identity of a father accused of kidnapping his London-based daughter in the US.

It believes Clark Rockefeller, 48 – accused of abducting Reigh Boss, seven – is Christian Gerhartsreiter.

LA police had earlier said he was thought to be the German national, also “of interest” to officers over the 1985 disappearance of a couple in the US.

Mr Rockefeller’s lawyer said his client had little memory of pre-1993 events.

The FBI said it had now matched fingerprints from old immigration papers of Mr Gerhartsreiter to the suspect who called himself Clark Rockefeller.

The prints were taken from papers dating back to the 1980s and matched with a wine glass touched in late July – around the time he is accused of abducting his daughter – as well as prints taken by Baltimore police after his arrest on 2 August.

Last week a spokesman for the LA County sheriff’s department said the accused had been a “person of interest” in the disappearance in San Marino, California, of Jonathan and Linda Sohus, from whom he had rented a guesthouse in the 1980s.

Skeletal remains believed to be those of Mr Sohus were unearthed at the couple’s property in 1994. No charges have ever been filed in the case.

The accused has said he now recalls living in the guesthouse at the time of the couple’s disappearance and also remembered using the name Christopher Chichester, while living in California.

Reunited

Lawyer Stephen Hrones said his client had told him that he barely knew the couple and that they had left while he was still in California.

He had used the name of Chichester because “he was aspiring to be an actor out there”, Mr Hrones said.

Jonathan and Linda Sohus went missing in 1985

He added there was nothing wrong with using aliases “as long as you don’t use it to defraud”.

The FBI said he was born in the former West Germany in 1961 and spent 27 years in the US using various names.

Daniel Conley, district attorney in Suffolk County, Massachusetts, said that by matching recent fingerprints to those on the old papers, the FBI’s fingerprint technicians had “brought science to bear where mere suspicion had prevailed”.

Mr Hrones said earlier this week that his client still believed his real name was Clark Rockefeller and that he had no recollection of being Christian Gerhartsreiter, but has not commented on the fingerprint results.

His client was arrested in Baltimore earlier this month over the alleged kidnapping of his daughter after a tip-off from a member of the public.

He was taken to Boston and remanded in custody by the court there.

He is charged with felony custodial kidnapping, assault and battery, and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon on 27 July.

The girl was reunited with her mother, Sandra Boss, with whom she lives in London.