Imaan Mazari and Hadi Ali Chattha Sentenced to 10 Years Each in Security Breach Case

Photo: AFP via Geo News, file photo from a court hearing in Islamabad on 5 December 2025.

An anti-terrorism court in Rawalpindi has sentenced human rights lawyer Imaan Zainab Mazari-Hazir and her husband, fellow lawyer Hadi Ali Chattha, to 10 years in prison each in the security breach case, in a verdict announced at Adiala Jail on Thursday, 29 October 2026.

Judge Tahir Abbas Sipra announced the sentence after reserving judgment on 27 October, when final arguments had finished. The court also imposed fines on both, and said the sentences under the three legal provisions will run at the same time, so the couple will serve 10 years in total.

Main News Report

According to Dawn, the couple were tried in jail in a 2024 case linked to the alleged disruption of an international cricket team's security route and incitement to public unrest. They were accused of removing barriers from the route, were indicted on 7 October, and pleaded not guilty.

Geo News reports the breakdown of the sentence in the court's order. Under the Anti-Terrorism Act of 1997, each was given 10 years and a fine of Rs100,000. Under Section 353 of the Pakistan Penal Code, each was given two years and a fine of Rs50,000. Under Section 186, each was given one year and a fine of Rs50,000. Put together, the fines come to Rs200,000 for each of them.

The court also gave the couple credit for the time they have already spent in custody, which counts towards the sentence. The prosecution presented seven witnesses during the trial, and a state counsel appointed by the court, Atif Mehmood, cross-examined them for the defence.

The defence had asked the court to hold off the verdict. Lawyer Aimal Mandokhail argued that petitions about the case were still pending before the Supreme Court and the Islamabad High Court, including a request to move the case to another court, and that the verdict should wait until those petitions were decided. The court went ahead and announced the sentence.

Background Context

This is the second conviction for the couple this year, and the case has a long trail behind it. The security breach case centres on events during the visit of an international cricket team to Pakistan in October 2024, when the couple were accused of interfering with security arrangements on a route closed for the team's convoy.

The couple have been in jail since their arrest on 23 January 2026 in a separate case about a protest outside the Islamabad High Court. Just a day later, a sessions court sentenced them to 17 years on multiple charges under the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act, in a case about social media posts. That conviction drew wide criticism from lawyers and rights groups.

On 17 September, the Supreme Court suspended those 17-year sentences and ordered the couple's release while their appeals were pending before the Islamabad High Court. Hours later, police arrested them again, this time in the security breach case, and they were produced before an anti-terrorism court.

Earlier this week, the couple went to the Supreme Court to challenge the Islamabad High Court's 19 October order refusing to stay the trial in the security breach case. The High Court had also heard their appeals against an earlier anti-terrorism court order that dismissed their challenges to the framing of charges and the use of terrorism provisions. It issued notices and said it would decide how to proceed after receiving replies.

Reactions and Statements

In statements recorded under Section 342 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, a step in which accused persons get to answer the case against them, Imaan and Hadi denied the charges. They said they were being targeted for their human rights work and for giving free legal help to poor and oppressed communities.

"I am a prisoner of conscience who has been at the receiving end of state persecution," the statements read, according to Dawn. Imaan said the couple had been presented in a cage during the jail trial, which stopped them from talking properly to their lawyer or the court, and that their rights to a fair trial and basic dignity had been breached from day one.

She also pointed out that the couple had already spent more than nine months in jail, had been handed 17-year sentences a day after their January arrest, and had spent the third year of their marriage in jail, separated from each other very early on. "We are being made an example to further cement the chilling effect against those who stand (or want to stand) against tyranny, oppression and injustice," she stated.

The defence's position in court was plain: the case should not have reached a verdict while petitions were still pending in the higher courts. No new statement from the prosecution or the government appeared in the reports published so far on Thursday.

The case sits in a wider debate about courts, lawyers and dissent in Pakistan, a debate seen in other recent court stories, including the resignation of Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani and Maulana Fazlur Rehman's charge that the government misused the Constitution in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. It also follows the hospitalisation of Noreen Niazi, sister of former prime minister Imran Khan, another case that has kept the courts in the news.

Why This News Matters

For ordinary readers, the key point is simple: a well-known human rights lawyer and her husband now face 10 years in jail in a case that started with barriers on a cricket team's security route, not with an attack or a bombing. That is why the case has drawn so much attention from lawyers, journalists and rights groups, who see it as a test of how anti-terrorism laws are used.

The plain-terms version of the sentence is this. The anti-terrorism law, the Anti-Terrorism Act of 1997, carries the longest term, 10 years. The other two provisions, Sections 353 and 186 of the Pakistan Penal Code, deal with obstructing public servants and using force against them while they are on duty. Because the sentences run at the same time rather than one after another, the couple serve 10 years, not 13, and the time they have already spent locked up counts towards it.

• Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997: 10 years each, Rs100,000 fine each
• Section 353, Pakistan Penal Code: 2 years each, Rs50,000 fine each
• Section 186, Pakistan Penal Code: 1 year each, Rs50,000 fine each
• Total to serve, sentences running together: 10 years each
• Total fines: Rs200,000 each

The verdict also matters because it comes after the Supreme Court had already suspended the couple's earlier 17-year sentences. Their re-arrest within hours of that relief, and now a fresh 10-year sentence, will shape how lawyers and rights groups talk about fair trial rights and the use of anti-terrorism courts in the weeks ahead.

Future Developments

What happens next will turn first on the petitions already pending before the Supreme Court and the Islamabad High Court, including the challenge to the High Court's refusal to stay the trial and the request to transfer the case. Those petitions were the reason the defence asked for the verdict to be delayed.

Next, watch for any appeal against the sentence itself, and for reactions from bar councils, rights groups and international observers, who criticised the couple's January arrest and the earlier social media posts conviction. The Islamabad High Court's handling of the pending appeals in the earlier case will also matter, since the Supreme Court released the couple on the condition that those appeals proceed.

For now, the couple remain in custody, and the sentence stands unless a higher court changes it.

Sources

Dawn: ATC sentences Imaan, Hadi to 10 years in security breach case
Geo News: Imaan Mazari, Hadi Ali Chattha sentenced to 10 years each in security breach case
The Express Tribune: Barrier removal case, ATC verdict against Imaan Mazari, Hadi Ali Chattha

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