Police found incriminating exchanges with victim's wife
Firad Muhammed jailed for 28 years. Picture: Met Police
A Southall man has been convicted of attempted murder after police linked him to a shooting by access his Facebook messages.
28-year-old Firad Muhammed of Ellison Gardens turned up at the front door of a house in Bromley on 20 October 2020 and shot the 32-year-old man who answered the door twice in the leg.
Muhammed then fled the scene and his victim was taken to hospital where his condition was assessed to not be life-threatening.
Initially detectives were baffled as the crime appeared to be motiveless. However, when they started the analysis of the victim’s wife’s phone, they found a number of romantic and flirtatious messages had been exchanged with Muhammed. He also told her that he regretted coming to her home to do the shooting and said he should have carried out the attack elsewhere in Bromley.
Muhammed was arrested and charged with attempted murder and possession of a firearm with intent to endanger life. He was sentenced to 28 years' imprisonment at Inner London Crown Court on Friday, 18 November after he was found guilty of both offences after a trial in July. He must serve at least two thirds of his sentence in jail.
Detective Constable Ben Briselden, the officer in the case, said, "Muhammed travelled to the victim's home address with the intention to kill him.
"When we started the investigation, there were no leads and we had to build the case through detailed mobile phone analysis.
"This could easily have been a murder investigation and I hope the sentence allows the victim, who has now made a full recovery, to move on with his life in the knowledge Muhammed is not going to be out of prison for a very long time.
DC Briselden and his colleague DC Imran Hansraj, who undertook the phone examination which cracked the case, received commendations from the judge in the case
Judge Ian Darling said during sentencing, “In this investigation there is no doubt they (the police) started from scratch and built a case painstakingly and thoroughly.
“The investigation into the shooting was fraught with difficulty, it seems no one was keen to tell the police anything of the truth.
“The Met Police had no active leads on which to investigate the shooting and were completely in the dark.
“The police set about a particularly onerous and impressive trawl through phone contacts to try and identify potential suspects. It was by its nature a slow and thankless task which thankfully and to the credit of the investigate officers finally bore fruit”
Value Reading Articles Like This? Help Us Produce More This site remains committed to providing local community news and public interest journalism. Articles such as the one above are integral to what we do. We aim to feature as much as possible on local societies, charities based in the area, fundraising efforts by residents, community-based initiatives and even helping people find missing pets. We've always done that and won't be changing, in fact we'd like to do more. However, the readership that these stories generates is often below that needed to cover the cost of producing them. Our financial resources are limited and the local media environment is intensely competitive so there is a constraint on what we can do. We are therefore asking our readers to consider offering financial support to these efforts. Any money given will help support community and public interest news and the expansion of our coverage in this area. A suggested monthly payment is £8 but we would be grateful for any amount for instance if you think this site offers the equivalent value of a subscription to a daily printed newspaper you may wish to consider £20 per month. If neither of these amounts is suitable for you then contact info@neighbournet.com and we can set up an alternative. All payments are made through a secure web site. One-off donations are also appreciated. Choose The Amount You Wish To Contribute. If you do support us in this way we'd be interested to hear what kind of articles you would like to see more of on the site – send your suggestions to the editor. For businesses we offer the chance to be a corporate sponsor of community content on the site. For £30 plus VAT per month you will be the designated sponsor of at least one article a month with your logo appearing if supplied. If there is a specific community group or initiative you'd like to support we can make sure your sponsorship is featured on related content for a one off payment of £50 plus VAT. All payments are made through a secure web site. |
November 21, 2022->->
