Jhalakathi judges' killing: What happened that day

The two judges were being driven to the court by an official microbus on November 14, 2005. The driver parked the vehicle and went to pick up another Judge Abdul Awal.

Militant cadre Iftekhar Hasan Al Mamun, 28, appeared from nowhere at 9:00am and tried to hand some leaflets over to the two judges - Shaheed Sohel Ahmed, 35, senior assistant judge of Nalchhiti upazila, and Jagannath Pandey, 38, senior assistant judge of the Sadar upazila.

ALSO READ: Jhalakathi judges’ killing: Asadul to be executed ‘tonight’

As the judges refused to accept the leaflets, the assassin hurled a bag at their vehicle and it exploded inside on impact with a big bang. The explosion shook two to three kilometres area around and blew up the roof of the microbus, reducing it to metal rubble.

Judge Sohel Ahmed was killed on the spot while Judge Pandey died on way to Barisal Sher-e-Bangla Medical College and Hospital.

Locals held Mamun immediately after the attack and turned him in to police and Rapid Action Battalion (Rab).

The JMB suicide bomber tried to detonate another bomb strapped to one of his thighs on way to the hospital, but the Rab and police foiled the attempt.

The seized handwritten leaflets say, "We don't want Taguti [non-Islamic] law, let Qur'anic law be introduced. Law framed by humans cannot continue and only the laws of Allah will prevail."

Earlier on October 3 and October 18 in 2005, the JMB launched two bomb attacks on the judiciary, leaving two dead and at least 39 including two judges injured.

The banned outfit carried out an attack on the courtrooms Chandpur, Laxmipur and Chittagong districts, killing the two and hurting 38 on October 3 that year. Militants hurled a bomb at the vehicle of Judge Biplop Goswami, leaving him injured in Sylhet on October 18.