Pakistan's Supreme Court today ordered that a special medical board be constituted to assess the current mental condition of a schizophrenic death row prisoner.
Imdad Ali, diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, was sentenced to death in 2001 over a shooting.
Ali has spent 14 years on death row, with three years in solitary confinement in the jail hospital due to his schizophrenia, said Justice Project Pakistan (JPP), a non-profit organisation working to save his life.
JPP said the Advocate General, Punjab and Prosecutor General, Punjab who appeared themselves in court, filed Ali's entire jail medical record since 2001 that was previously unavailable and declares him mentally unfit to be hanged.
The government's counsel mentioned that the state had failed to disclose these records to the courts in the trial and appellate proceedings.
The court said that it cannot look at additional evidence at this point in the proceedings and did not take the records into consideration.
However, it ordered that a 5-member medical board, composed of psychologists and psychiatrists be assembled, and that a list of competent doctors be submitted to the court by all parties by Wednesday.
The court also said Ali's mental condition during his trial is irrelevant as that has achieved finality in the appeal.
The court chose to focus on his current mental state and whether it qualifies him as a person of unsound mind.
It said that his present state of mind will show whether he deserves any leniency under the different international treaties and protocols signed by Pakistan.
The next hearing has been scheduled for November 16.
Earlier, last month the Supreme Court rejected a plea to cancel the hanging saying schizophrenia is not a "permanent" mental disorder.
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