A man has been jailed for suffocating a student with a face mask and dumping her body in undergrowth inside a large suitcase.
Muhammad Arslan, 27, killed 21-year-old Hina Bashir by asphyxiation after she visited his shared flat in Ilford, east London, in July last year.
Arslan told the court heard that he had attempted to quieten her when he stuffed a floral-patterned mask into her mouth, but was sentenced to life in prison after jurors at the Old Bailey found him guilty of murder.
The defendant had admitted manslaughter on the first day of his trial, but denied murder and perverting the course of justice by concealing Ms Bashir’s body.
Prosecutors rejected his explanation that he had tried to quiet the student while confronting her over nude photos of her he was sent as “elaborate and concocted”.
They asserted instead that he had killed his allegedly longtime friend out of anger and jealousy.
Arslan had claimed in evidence that the two had been friendly since they were 11, and that romance had followed, but they could not meet openly for cultural reasons.
He told the court it was a “fantasy” that she was his fiancee, but said he still wished to have a relationship.
After jurors handed down their verdict on Wednesday, June 21, presiding judge Richard Marks KC sentenced Arslan to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 20 years for the murder.
He also received five years running concurrently for perverting the court of justice.
The judge said: “I am satisfied…that your unrequited feelings for Hina boiled over and resulted in you taking hold of a facemask and forcing it into the back of her mouth which led to her collapse and ultimately to her death from asphyxiation.”
He concluded that Arslan’s “prime motivation” was to save himself after killing Ms Bashir.
The judge said the defendant had embarked on a “campaign of lies” to conceal what he had done.
He added he was “lying to all and sundry” before he disposed her body in a “shocking and callous manner”.
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