TikTok star and gang of seven murdered mother’s lover in high-speed chase, court hears

A TikTok star plotted to have a man who threatened to expose an affair with her mother ‘jumped by guys’ just a month before he was murdered, a court heard today. 

Social media influencer Mahek Bukhari, 23, told her mother Ansreen in a message that her young lover, 21-year-old Saqib Hussain, ‘won’t know what day it is’, Leicester Crown Court heard.

Mr Hussain had been having a three-year fling with 45-year-old Ansreen, the jury was told, but he threatened to leak a sex tape they had made to her husband and family when she tried to end their relationship.

The jury was also told that Mahek lured Mr Hussain into a trap on the night he died by promising to pay back money owed to him. 

Mr Hussain and his friend, Mohammed Hashim Ijazuddin, also 21, died instantly after their Skoda Fabia burst into flames when it was rammed off the road in Leicester on February 11 this year.

A harrowing 999 call was played to the jury this morning in which Mr Hussain is heard pleading: ‘They’re right behind. They’re hitting into the back of the car very fast. Please I’m begging you, I’m going to die.’

He screamed before a loud crash was heard.

Before her arrest, Mahek Bukhari had boasted of more than 126,000 followers on TikTok and a further 43,000 on Instagram.

She had regularly shared snippets of her life, including her outfits, make-up and handbags, and has also appeared in videos alongside her mum.

But she is now charged with two counts of murder, and of manslaughter as a possible alternative, alongside her mother and friend Natasha Akhtar, 22.

They appeared in the dock at Leicester Crown Court this morning along with Raees Jamal, 22, Rekan Karwan, 28, Mohammed Patel, 20, Sanaf Gulammustafa, 22 and Ameer Jamal, 27, who are also facing the same charges and have all pleaded not guilty.

The jury was told that police were called to the wreckage of a silver Skoda Fabia at the side of the A46 in the early hours of February 11 in Six Fields, Leicestershire.

The car had split into two on the point of impact and was soon ablaze.

Officers initially believed it to be a non-fatal road traffic accident (RTA) until two charred bodies were later found in the wreckage. 

Prosecutor Collingwood Thompson KC told the jury: ‘You will ask why it was that police knew this was not a tragic RTA but deliberate murder. The answer lies in something unknown to these defendants at the time. In a 999 call Saqib Hussain made shortly before this incident occurred.

‘The content you may find distressing but it explains why police knew it was no ordinary traffic accident but murder. This telephone call led to a major investigation into this case which revealed a story of love, obsession, anger, attempts at extortion and ultimately murder.’

The six-minute 999-call began with Hussain telling the operator that he was being tailed by another car.

He said: ‘They’re trying to block me in. I can’t get to a police station. There are guys following me with balaclavas on. I’m on the A46, they’re trying to ram me off the road.’

He told the operator he was driving past Ratcliffe College and was being chased by two vehicles.

Growing more desperate as the cars ran into the back of his car, he told the operator that he could not read their registration plates before adding: ‘They’re trying to kill me. Please sir I just need help.’

He gave his name and told the operator he lived in Banbury, Oxfordshire but had come to Leicester with Mr Ijazuddin for some food and to meet a friend.

Just before the crash is heard Mr Hussain says: ‘They’re right behind. They’re hitting into the back of the car very fast. Please I’m begging you I’m going to die.’

Relatives of the victims wept in court as the 999 call was played.

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Mr Thompson KC said: ‘This was no accident, he knew what was happening to him.’

Mr Hussain’s sister, Sama Hussain, told police that her brother had become involved in a relationship with an older woman in her 40s some time around 2019.

She said the woman’s name was ‘Anzy’ and that she was married and had children including a daughter called ‘Maya’.

Mr Thompson KC said ‘Anzy’ was Ansreen and ‘Maya’ was Mahek, who he said was aware of her mother’s relationship and ‘whilst happy to tolerate it she was not approving’.

At first Mr Hussain treated his relationship with Ansreen as a ‘bit of fun’ and they would break up and get back together again.

But he soon told friends that he had fallen in love with her. Data later uncovered by detectives showed that he had contacted her 1,702 times between August 10, 2021 and February 9, 2022.

In turn, when information from her phone was retrieved, she had contacted him 214 times. Some of those were for only a matter of seconds and missed calls.

Material taken from the iCloud found sexually explicit videos and pictures involving them both.

By January 2022, Ansreen wished to end the affair and told Mr Hussain this.

Mr Thomson KC said ‘he could not accept the decision she had made’.

He said: ‘Various messages between them show he became increasingly obsessive, professing love and begging her to continue, but other messages show anger and frustration that she wouldn’t return his calls.

‘On the 10th of February, endless calls were made by Saqib to Ansreen’s phone that were never answered. That anger and frustration that she wouldn’t answer his calls led him take further action.

‘It led to an attempt to blackmail Ansreen in order to persuade her to contact him. He threatened to send sexually explicit material to her husband and to her son unless she agreed to speak to him.’

Mr Thompson KC told the court that Mahek messaged her mother on January 4, 2022 and said: ‘I’ll soon get him jumped by guys and he wont know what day it is.’

The prosecutor added: ‘There is clear inference, the Crown say, that by this date Ansreen must have told her daughter about the threats Saqib was making about theirs affair.

‘That’s her saying “I’ll take care of that, get him jumped by guys”. We’ll come to hear he was being jumped mostly by guys and killed.

Mr Hussain later messaged Mahek about her mother and said: ‘Let her know I’m on my way, get her to call me.’

But she replied: ‘No, take the message. This year you’ll be gone Saqib. I’ve got every threat you’ve given my mum to expose her. Narcissistic bastard. Carry on speaking to her now you will see movement soon.’

Mr Thompson KC told the jury: ‘The Crown says this shows Mahek Bukhari had taken it on herself stop Saqib contacting her mother and if necessary was prepared to use force, to get someone to “jump him” to stop Saqib. It gives you a flavour of how they were dealing with the threat posed by Saqib in dealing with affair.’

He added: ‘A way had to be found to silence Saqib – either by causing him a really serious injury to warn him or to silence him forever by killing him.

‘The revelation of the affair could have ruined Asreen Bukhari’s marriage and damaged her reputation in her community.

‘It could also have affected Mahek’s relationship with her father because she knew about the affair.

‘Mahek was a social influencer and had a large number of followers on TikTok and the revelations of the affair might have been damaging to her standing with her followers.’

Four hours before Mr Hussain was killed, he had messaged Mahek pleading for a chance to speak to Ansreen.

When she refused, he threatened to send explicit pictures to Mahek’s father, who was unaware of the affair.

Saqib’s message read: ‘I’m going to message your dad. Show him all the proof – the pictures, the messages with her saying “I love you”.

‘Going to send all the dirty videos and say to him I want my money.’

Data uncovered by police showed that at about 8pm on February 10, he was about to set off for Stoke-on-Trent where Ansreen lived with her husband.

He was traced leaving his home in Banbury and heading north.

Mr Thompson KC said: ‘The threat is that Saqib would turn up at the family home in Stoke on Trent and that was something they could not risk.’

Mahek intervened – the court was told – and offered to meet with him and her mother in Loughborough before changing the location to Leicester.

At about 9.15pm, as Mr Hussain was trying to find out the exact location of the meeting, Mahek messaged him: ‘Sorted money.’

Mr Thompson said: ‘The Crown’s case is there never was money to hand over to him. This was simply a lure to get him into a trap.’

Mr Ijazuddin, meanwhile, had agreed to drive Mr Hussain, who he had known since school, to Leicester. Mr Thompson KC said it was ‘a fatal mistake that cost him his life.’

Two other friends said they were unable to give him a lift, to which the prosecutor added: ‘Tragically, that left only Hashim, who agreed to drive Saqib from Banbury to the meeting place.’ 

The trial continues.