British-Pakistani TikToker Mahek Bukhari and her mother convicted of double murder
British-Pakistani TikToker Mahek Bukhari and her mother have been convicted of double murder following a trial at Leicester Crown Court.
TikTok influencer Mahek Bukhari, 24, was convicted by a jury along with their mother Ansreen Bukhari, 47, after 28 hours of deliberations on Friday.
Both were found guilty of murdering Saqib Hussain and Mohammed Hashim Ijazuddin.
Both men died in a high-speed car chase in February 2022.
During the three-month trial at Leicester Crown Court, prosecutors successfully argued that Mr. Hussain and Mr. Ijazuddin were deliberately rammed off the road.
Mahek, 24, was said to have “ambushed” Mr. Hussain after he threatened to leak sexually explicit material exposing a long-running affair he had been having with her 46-year-old mother.
Finding the people responsible for the deaths of Saqib Hussain and Mohammed Hashim Ijazuddin was an extremely complex investigation.
Below outlines our police investigation and how we brought those responsible for the murder of two young men to justice.https://t.co/9HzHLhJSnU pic.twitter.com/0C4RqRHk8C
— Leicestershire Police (@leicspolice) August 4, 2023
Prosecutors said he was “lured” into a meeting with the mother-daughter-duo on the pretense of giving him back the £3,000 he said he had spent on taking his older lover out during their affair.
The court proceedings revealed that Mr. Hussain and Mr. Ijazuddin, who had driven his friend to Leicester for the meeting as a “favour”, were instead ambushed and then chased before the fatal crash.
The court was told that Mr. Ijazuddin’s Skoda Fabia split in two and caught fire after hitting a tree in the early hours of February 11 last year.
Footage from police attending the crash scene at about 1.35 am showed the Skoda in flames, resting against a tree by the junction.
The pair’s car had been rammed by an Audi TT belonging to TikTok star Mahek Bukhari, and a blue Seat Leon belonging to Natasha Akhtar. Neither was driving the vehicle at the time of the incident.
The court heard how “completely innocent” Mr. Ijazuddin agreed to drive his friend to Leicester that night and had been “in the wrong place at the wrong time”, with the favour to Mr. Hussain turning out “to be a tragic and fatal mistake”, prosecutors said.
As reported, fellow defendants Rekhan Karwan and Raees Jamal were also found guilty of two counts of murder, while Natasha Akhtar, Ameer Jamal, and Sanaf Gulamustafa were all found not guilty of murder, but guilty of two counts of manslaughter.
Co-defendant Mohammed Patel was cleared of murder and manslaughter after having claimed to only be an unwitting witness to the events.
The police inquiries revealed that Mr. Hussain had been in a relationship with Ms. Ansreen for three years. After Ansreen Bukhari tried to end the affair, Mr. Hussain made threats to expose the relationship with her husband and share her videos. Ms Ansreen offered to pay back the £3,000 which Mr Hussain had spent during the relationship and it was arranged for Mr Hussain to meet with Ms Ansreen and her daughter.
“…Ansreen and Mahek Bukhari arrived at the arranged meet-up in the Tesco car park in Hamilton, Leicester, along with…six other defendants. The eight defendants were in two vehicles — an Audi TT and a Seat Leon. Mr. Hussain then arrived at the car park in a Skoda Fabia, being driven by his friend Mr. Ijazuddin,” police said.
