Asylum seeker hacked family to death

A FAILED asylum seeker was jailed for life yesterday for hacking to death his four-year-old stepdaughter, his wife and her disabled brother with a machete-like kitchen knife.

The bodies of Fahmeda Ahmed, her mother Nurjahan Khatun, 31, and 35-year-old uncle Kamal Uddin were discovered in their tower block flat in east London after neighbours heard screaming.

At Inner London Crown Court, Badshu Miah, 30, pleaded guilty to the three murders on September 5 last year.

Miah came to Britain in 1996 from Bangladesh and met his wife in 2000. Jeremy Donne QC, prosecuting, said: “He had no legitimate citizenship in this country which was a source of irritation between him and his wife.”

Miah had been working as a tandoori chef when he attacked the family in their flat in Bethnal Green’s Dorset estate.

The court heard Nurjahan arrived in Britain with her family at the age of 18 in 1989 and had married but divorced after the birth of her daughter.

Her brother, Kamal, was living with his sister at the time of the death.

Mr Donne said: “The defendant had no legitimate residency or citizenship in this country. He was a failed asylum seeker which was a source of irritation between him and his wife.”

The pair had an arranged marriage, giving Nurjahan a husband to provide for herself and daughter and the defendant sought a wife with British citizenship to allow him stay in the country.

But the relationship disintegrated as he became suspicious that she was having affairs Mr Donne said.

“At first they were outwardly content but they soon ran into difficulties.

Family members stated that the defendant demanded that his wife take care of him and suggested she was sleeping with other men.

Family reconciliation meetings were held and at the last one around a month before the attack

Miah repeated his suspicions about his wife but “did not provide any grounds for his suspicions.”