Curry house boss who hacked rival takeaway owner to death during feud faces jail

Victim: Abdul Samad, 25, was murdered in Islington in 1997
Metropolitan Police
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A Bangladeshi restaurant boss who hacked a rival takeaway owner to death during a violent London curry house feud nearly 20 years ago is facing life in prison today.

Abdul Samad, 25, was lured to the home of then-Solicitor General Lord Falconer, in Canonbury, Islington with a bogus food order on May 21 1997.

The delivery was part of a carefully orchestrated plot for revenge after Mr Samad refused to mediate in a dispute between two curry houses which were locked in a dispute.

Mr Samad was pounced upon by masked men armed with a meat cleaver, knives and a baseball bat, who chased him along the quiet residential street before hacking him to death on the pavement.

One of the killers, Moheuddin Bablu, 41, is already serving at least 18 years of a life sentence for the murder, having been convicted in March 2012.

His accomplice, Foyjur Rahman, 44, today joined him behind bars after being convicted after a two week trial of the murder.

Rahman fled the UK shortly after the 1997 killing but remained on an international wanted list. He was eventually snared by the FBI in December last year outside the computer store he managed in Odessa, West Texas.

The Old Bailey heard how Mr Samad, a married father-of-two who ran Putney takeaway Curry-in-a-Hurry, shouted out: "He's got a knife. He wants to kill me. Be careful”, just moments before the fatal attack as he ran down the street.

The violence stemmed from a dispute between the Stoke Newington Boys and a rival gang of curry house owners. Mr Samad was caught in the middle when he refused to get involved.

“The victim had resisted the pressure and declined to get involved and he had been threatened with violence, but still he refused to get involved”, said prosecutor Mark Ellison QC.

“He said he had already declined to help and he wasn't going to change his mind, he said he couldn't and wouldn't help and he didn't want to help.

“He was told he would ‘get it’ if he didn't help.”

The year before the murder had been punctuated by street fights and violence acts of retribution between the two rival groups.

Both Rahman and Bablu were caught by DNA they left on masks which had been hurriedly abandoned after the attack, which was witnessed by several neighbours and passers-by in Alwyne Road.

Mr Samad suffered 18 separate chopping and knife wounds in the attack and died in the early hours of the following morning from a heart attack during emergency surgery.

A doctor described his injuries as "horrific - the like I have never seen before in my career", jurors were told.

Judge Peter Rook QC will impose a life sentence on Rahman later, deciding how long he should serve behind bars before being considered for release.

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