A man found guilty of murdering a law student who tried to make peace between rowing neighbours in London’s East End has been jailed for life with a minimum 14 years.
Shofique Uddin, 51, made a brief appearance at the Old Bailey today for sentencing, following the dispute outside his maisonette at Lanterns Way in Millwall, on the Isle of Dogs.
He was found guilty of murder yesterday after a four-week trial.
The confrontation with his neighbours in May last year was prompted by a woman cleaning a carpet with a hose in her back garden.
Several relatives arrived at the housing complex near Canary Wharf as the row escalated, including 20-year-old Sultan Ahmed the nephew of one of the warring neighbours.
Sultan, a former pupil at Stepney Green Maths & Computing College who had gone on to study law at Greenwich University, was stabbed in the back by Uddin in a frenzied attack.
Police called to the disturbance found him inside the hallway of his uncle’s house with a single stab wound and gave emergency treatment before an ambulance crew and the Air Ambulance paramedics from the Royal London Hospital arrived.
Other neighbours were in shock following the violence that rocked the quiet Lanterns Way.
“I’m sad for the boy who died,” said mother-of-six Rehana Rahman after the killing. “They’re a religious family. I was horrified when I saw the boy with blood on his face fall to the ground.”
Cause of death was later given at a post-mortem examination at Poplar Mortuary as a single stab wound to his heart and left lung.
Uddin was found guilty yesterday of his murder by a jury in a 10-to-two majority verdict. His wife Gulbahar Begum, also 51, was acquitted on two charges of GBH with intent. Their daughter Rahela Begum, 27, had previously been acquitted of ABH.
Sultan’s sister Jannatul said after the hearing: “He wanted to help, but ended up helpless himself. He lost his life over such a tiny thing.”
The dispute began when Uddin’s son shouted at a neighbour washing carpets with a hose in her garden when the dirty water seeped onto their property.
Relatives including Sultan arrived later that evening to confront him.
But Sultan was stabbed in the back during the melee. He was carried into his uncle’s house where he died just 40 minutes later.
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