Bournemouth: Asylum seekers guilty of killing man outside Tube shop
An Afghan asylum seeker who stabbed a man to death after an argument over a scooter has been found guilty of murder.
Lawangeen Abdulrahimzai killed 21-year-old Thomas Roberts outside a Subway sandwich shop in Bournemouth, Dorset, in March last year.
Abdulrahimzai, 21, admitted manslaughter but it took the jury at Salisbury Crown Court 12 hours to find him guilty of murder by a majority today.
Mr Roberts acted as a “peacemaker” in the early hours of March 12, 2022 after his friend James Medway got into an argument with Abdulrahimzai.
Mr Medway went to take an electric scooter that Abdulrahimzai had claimed for himself and left it propped up against the window of the shop on Old Christchurch Road.
In the confrontation, which lasted just 24 seconds, Mr Roberts slapped Abdulrahimzai in the face.
Abdulrahimzai then revealed the knife he had hidden between the pair of pants he was wearing and stabbed Mr Roberts twice before fleeing into the nearby forest.
He buried the knife in the forest before burning the pants, jacket and Afghan flag he wore as a scarf.
However, he dropped his cell phone while fleeing and it was traced to his home address.
Abdulrahimzai, who was living in Poole at the time of the offence, arrived in the UK in December 2019 and told authorities he was 16 when he was arrested, but the court has since determined he is now 21.
In his defence, Abdulrahimzai said he had no intention of killing Mr Roberts or causing him serious harm – he “acted on instinct”, said he “feared for his life” and felt he had to defend himself.
The court heard that his parents had been killed and that he had been tortured by the Taliban, so he carried a knife for his own protection.
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https://metro.co.uk/2023/01/23/bournemouth-asylum-seeker-guilty-of-killing-man-outside-subway-shop-18149975/ Bournemouth: Asylum seekers guilty of killing man outside Tube shop