young and inexperienced lawyers or those who are unable to find work on their own. In the absence of minimum quality standards, the quality of legal representation provided by these lawyers is poor, with most never appearing for hearings and/or meeting with the clients. Shafqat Hussain was convicted for alleged murder and kidnapping on the basis of a single piece of evidence; a confession extracted after nine days of torture in November, 2004. Shafqat was a juvenile offender. His lawyer failed to raise a single shred of evidence regarding the torture he had endured at the hands of the police or his juvenility that could have prevented him from being convicted or sentenced to death. The lawyer told Shafqat that “no one leaves the anti-terrorism courts without a death sentence” thereby deeming it to be pointless to raise a defence for his client. Similarly, Tariq Mukhtar was arrested along with 11 male members of his family for the death of four persons that occurred as a consequence of a fight that broke out between two families over a property feud. The police looted their house under the guise of “search and seizure” and stole many valuable possessions. The loss of material possessions and arrest of all adult male members prevented them from hiring a lawyer throughout their trial. Additionally, Tariq and his co-accused were never informed of the date of their appeal at the High Court and were unable arrange any representation. The appeal was thus dismissed without their knowledge. As a result, accused persons prefer to engage their own counsel, often at a heavy cost which they are unable to bear. Interviews with accused revealed that the quality of private counsel is extremely poor. More than half the interviewees suffered from inadequate representation particularly in the early stages of their cases and in almost all cases the lawyers failed to challenge the jurisdiction of the Anti-Terrorism Courts over the alleged offences, even if the offence clearly did not fall within the definition of terrorism. Lawyers tend to take advantage of indigent prisoners and their family through extracting exorbitant fees and failing to raise an adequate defence. In certain cases, egregious errors by lawyers directly resulted in convictions based on false testimony, and in the executions of juvenile offenders and other vulnerable groups that are owed special protections under international law. The consequences of poor representation are worsened by the fact that the law provides no remedy, such as post-conviction reviews, on grounds of incompetent or ineffective counsel.64 For example, Amjad Ali was convicted of kidnapping for ransom and sentenced to death by Anti-Terrorism Court, Gujranwala on 31 January, 2007. Amjad’s family was too poor to hire a lawyer and he had to be represented by the counsel of his co-accused who he never met outside the courtroom. The counsel did not raise a single piece of evidence in Amjad’s defence, nor was he provided a chance to record his statement. “Lawyers appointed at state expense are mostly new and inexperienced and often have limited experience with trials under the ATC” Syed Abbas Haider, lawyer with 10 years’ experience handling ATC cases. 64 A Most Serious Crime. P. 16 TRIAL AND TERROR 21