TikTok star murdered mother's lover and rammed him off the road after he threatened to leak sex tape exposing affair
4 August 2023, 17:32 | Updated: 4 August 2023, 21:10
A TikTok influencer has been found guilty of murdering two men in an ambush and high-speed car chase.
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Mahek Bukhari, who also made videos for YouTube, wept in the dock as she and her mother Ansreen Bukhari were convicted of killing Saqib Hussain and Mohammed Hashim Ijazuddin.
Their car crashed off the A46 near Leicester and smashed into a tree, which split in two before catching fire at a junction early on February 11 last year.
The 21-year-olds were being chased by eight people in an Audi and a Seat.
Bukhari interview
Prosecutors said they were deliberately rammed of the road after Hussain threatened to expose a three-year affair he had with Bukhari's mother.
That led the 24-year-old to ambush him, Leicester Crown Court heard.
Footage released after the trial showed how she lied to police in her interview with detectives about what happened.
Mahek told them how other cars had been involved instead of her - and that she had innocently been driving with her mother trying to avoid any incident.
"I've kept my distance... this car was not threatening me but agitating the blue car... this silver car was not letting the blue car go.
"So I was thinking, OK, they're not agitating me, they're not trying to put me off my driving...
"I've gone past and I've gone further away... and then the blue car has caught up with me... I don't know who they are... All I hear was like a bang... the silver car's hit the blue car.
"I said to my mum, "What's going on? What is wrong - are they drunk? What are they trying to do to this blue car in general?"
Rekhan Karwan and Raees Jamal were found guilty of two counts of murder alongside Bukhari and Ansreen, while Natasha Akhtar, Ameer Jamal and Sanaf Gulamustafa were all cleared of murder, but convicted of two counts of manslaughter.
Mohammed Patel was found not guilty of murder or manslaughter.
Hussain was in Ijazuddin's Skoda Fabia as the two 21-year-olds from Banbury, Oxfordshire were chased down.
He had been romantically involved with Ansreen Bukhari, 46, and was threatening to use sexual material to expose their affair.
Footage - Mahek and Ansreen Bukhari
Prosecutor Collingwood Thompson KC had told jurors the case was a "story of love, obsession, extortion and, ultimately, the Crown allege - cold-blooded murder".
Ansreen Bukhari was married and has children. Hussain "appeared to be in love" with her, while Mahek was aware of it and tolerated it, though may not have approved of it.
Hussain and Ijazuddin had been lured to a meeting with the Bukharis, believing they would be given back £3,000 he paid taking out Ansreen on dates, jurors heard.
Ijazuddin drove his friend there as a favour but they were ambushed and chased down.
As they were pursued by the eight defendants, Hussain - sitting in the Skoda's front passenger seat - desperately called 999 to say the car was being hit by attackers wearing balaclavas.
"They're trying to kill me, they're trying to kill me. I'm just getting rammed off the road," he said, adding: "Please, I am begging you."
He then said "oh my god" before a scream went out. The call suddenly cuts out after the sound of a crash.
The defendants will be sentenced on September 1. Judge Timothy Spencer KC told them the sentence will be "very serious".
