00:00:05
NARRATOR: Muhammad Dilawer Miah
had been married for 33 days. A man who lived for
his faith, settling
00:00:12
down with a devout
Muslim wife was everything he'd ever wanted. PETER BLEKSLEY: Muhammad was a
gentle, kind, much liked man.
00:00:22
NARRATOR: His new wife
was Mahmuda Khatun, a woman who like him
had arrived in London
00:00:27
from Bangladesh as a child. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
They got on well. They had similar interests.
00:00:32
And they started to look
forward to a life together. NARRATOR: But less than five
weeks after their wedding,
00:00:37
the groom was found
lying in a pool of blood in the hallway of
the marital home.
00:00:41
The body was lying
there where it had fallen. The paramedics
came in but it was clear that life was extinct.
00:00:47
PETER BLEKSLEY: He was quiet,
gentle, a hardworking man. And nobody could
think of a reason
00:00:54
why anybody would
want to murder him. NARRATOR: What lay
behind the ugly murder of a man just married
and who seemed to have
00:01:02
no enemies in the world? [music playing] Summer 2007. A hot, sunny day in bustling
Bethnal Green, East London.
00:01:28
Muhammad Dilawer Miah marries
Mahmuda Khatun in a marriage arranged by their families.
00:01:34
150 guests attend the wedding. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
Everyone who knew Miah spoke of a quiet,
unassuming man who
00:01:41
lived for his marriage,
his work, and his faith. EMMA KENNY: She likes him. He's a nice guy.
00:01:48
And so she agrees to get engaged
to him because she sees him as a safe bet and somebody
that she hopes in the end
00:01:53
she'll grow to love. NARRATOR: Fast approaching 30,
it was time for both of them
00:01:59
to settle down. Perhaps to think about
starting a family. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: He
was in his late 20s.
00:02:05
And the pair seemed
a really good match, both on paper and in practice. They got on well.
00:02:10
They had similar interests. And they started to look
forward to a life together NARRATOR: Born in
Bangladesh, Mahmuda Khatun
00:02:19
had moved to London with her
family at the age of six. Her father was a respected
local religious leader.
00:02:26
But she and her siblings
had been allowed to lead a relatively Western life. Mahmuda had attended a local
girls school before studying
00:02:34
business at college. But she was soon to
discover that that didn't mean she was free
from the expectations
00:02:41
of her family and community. JO SIDHU: When she
was about 21, she was married by
arrangement to a man
00:02:48
that her family
had chosen for her. NARRATOR: The marriage
was not a success. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
Mahmuda claimed
00:02:55
that her new husband was both
physically and psychologically abusive towards her.
00:03:00
And for his part, he claimed
that Mahmuda never instigated any affection or responded
to him in any way
00:03:08
during their marriage. NARRATOR: He claimed that
Mahmuda made no effort with the marriage
and always seemed
00:03:15
to be going home to her family
or chatting on the telephone with her friends. There was no love.
00:03:21
She had no feelings
for her husband. And in fact, the frustration
that she felt in that marriage
00:03:25
boiled over. Her husband became
very angry with her. Felt that she wasn't
being an obedient wife.
00:03:31
And he'd beat her. She complained to her
family about the marriage. She wanted out.
00:03:38
She tolerated the abuse
for a period of time. And eventually, she managed
to persuade her mom and dad
00:03:45
that she should have a divorce. With great reluctance,
they agreed. NARRATOR: Freed
from the shackles
00:03:54
of a loveless marriage,
Mahmuda found herself living the life of a single,
independent young woman
00:03:59
once again. Life was good. JO SIDHU: For several
years after the end of her first marriage,
she had her freedom.
00:04:07
She was able to
complete her education, to get qualifications, and
lead an independent existence
00:04:12
as far as she could with
a really interesting job. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: Soon after,
Mahmuda moved out of the family
00:04:19
home and into a place called
Fidelis House in Liverpool Street, which was a hostel
designed for people waiting
00:04:27
for local authority housing. JO SIDHU: She was a working
young woman in London. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
Things were going
00:04:35
really well by this point. Mahmuda had started
working in an optician's as an optician's assistant.
00:04:42
Her career was going well. She was promoted
to branch manager. NARRATOR: This was
all Mahmuda had
00:04:48
ever wanted, the opportunity
to choose her own path. JO SIDHU: She'd been a girl
brought up with expectations.
00:04:56
Expectations that she'd
be a good Muslim girl. That she would be
dutiful to her parents.
00:05:00
That she'd be obedient
and loyal to her family. But she wanted something
else from her life.
00:05:07
NARRATOR: The single
life that wasn't to last. Her parents, deeply religious
Bangladeshi Muslims,
00:05:13
had other plans. JO SIDHU: As the years
passed, her parents again prevailed
upon her and said
00:05:18
to her that she couldn't
remain as a divorcee in their community. That eventually, she would have
to settle down with someone
00:05:24
from a similar background. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: Her
parents began looking again for another husband.
00:05:29
They really wanted
her to settle down. Perhaps, start a family. EMMA KENNY: The women
who were growing up
00:05:34
in strict Muslim
culture, it's incredibly powerful to have your parents
wanting you to marry somebody.
00:05:41
Because essentially,
you think of the world in a community context. Making sure that you don't
bring shame on your family
00:05:46
is very powerful. JO SIDHU: And for a while
she was able to persuade them to hold off.
00:05:52
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
They weren't going to force Mahmuda into anything. This was an arranged marriage
but by no means a forced one.
00:05:58
In fact, Mahmuda
was able to reject six or seven potential suitors. NARRATOR: Eventually,
Mahmuda was
00:06:05
introduced to Muhammad Dilawer
Miah, known to his friends as Amin. He was a quiet, hard working man
who worked as a kitchen porter
00:06:15
at a casino on an upmarket
street in London's West End. Like Mahmuda, he'd been
born in Bangladesh.
00:06:23
The youngest of four
children, he'd come to the UK in his teens, followed
a few years later
00:06:28
by his older sister Sader. He prayed five times a day
and was a regular worshipper
00:06:34
at his local mosque. He was known to be
serious and devout. It was said that he had no
enemies, quarreled with no one.
00:06:43
Meanwhile, friends were
confused that Mahmuda Khatun had agreed to marriage with Amin.
00:06:48
Perhaps, she simply
felt that she could no longer say no to her parents. Time eventually ran out for
her and she had to say yes.
00:06:56
She did however,
feel some degree of warmth towards Muhammad. He was the best of the
bunch, she thought.
00:07:05
And she felt that maybe in time
she could learn to love him. NARRATOR: Mahmuda had agreed
to give marriage another go.
00:07:14
But was it what
she really wanted? Her barrister, Jo
Sidhu, believes she was responding to
overwhelming pressure
00:07:21
from the people around her. JO SIDHU: She made an effort. She realized that she
had expectations on her
00:07:26
from her family and
from the community, and she tried to meet
those expectations.
00:07:30
She had to settle
for something, and he at least seemed
to be a person who was going to be kind to her.
00:07:39
NARRATOR: A dowry of
10,000 pounds was agreed. Amin paid 4,000 pounds
to Mahmuda's parents,
00:07:45
with the rest to follow. Mahmuda moved her belongings
out of her bachelorette pad
00:07:50
in Liverpool Street, and
made the journey 2 miles east to Amin's flat
in Bethnal Green.
00:07:56
It was a place he'd
redecorated especially to please his new wife. Amin was happy to settle down.
00:08:02
He wanted Mahmuda to be happy. And he went to a
great deal of effort to make sure that their
marriage would work.
00:08:09
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
Miah's employers had paid for them to go on a
short honeymoon in Cheshire.
00:08:15
He'd even changed his hours
so that he could spend more time with his new bride.
00:08:20
NARRATOR: But before
their wedding gifts were even unwrapped, Amin
made a shocking discovery
00:08:25
about his new wife. PETER BLEKSLEY: There
were complications in the relationship between
Mahmuda and Muhammad
00:08:32
because she was communicating
an awful lot with a man that she worked with. A man called Nasser Hussain.
00:08:43
JO SIDHU: When she was
working in an optician's, she met a guy. There was a relationship
that developed between them.
00:08:50
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
Mahmuda and Hussain had had text conversations and
calls numerous times a day.
00:08:57
An average of 10 times a day. This contact had carried
on right the way up to the wedding and beyond.
00:09:04
PETER BLEKSLEY: On
Mahmuda's wedding day, she exchanged texts and
calls with Nasser Hussain.
00:09:09
On her honeymoon,
she exchanged texts and calls with Nasser Hussein. And in the 33 days of
her marriage to Muhammad,
00:09:19
Nasser Hussain and
Mahmuda contacted one another 395 times. JO SIDHU: No one ever
knew the full depth.
00:09:33
But undoubtedly, she felt
an emotional attachment towards him. EMMA KENNY: If you're
texting a male when you're
00:09:40
on your wedding day,
it means that you have some kind of
intense relationship or some attraction
to that person.
00:09:46
Imagine the way you'd feel. You've got married
to somebody else, but you're actually
interested in another party.
00:09:53
PETER BLEKSLEY: Not
perhaps the behavior you would expect of a
devoted wife, should we say.
00:10:00
NARRATOR: Even
worse, Mahmuda made little attempt to hide
her friendship with Nasser
00:10:04
from her new husband. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: He
was becoming increasingly perturbed by the
numerous late-night calls
00:10:11
that Mahmuda was making
on a hidden mobile phone. In fact, Miah had confronted
her about these calls
00:10:17
and she'd refused to tell him
who she was talking to and why. He'd even said to Mahmuda, look,
if-- if you're seeing someone
00:10:25
I'll be devastated,
but I understand. Let's-- let's call it a day. I'll go back to my family.
00:10:31
You go back to yours. He was even prepared to
give her that dignity and to end the relationship.
00:10:38
But he said Mahmuda wouldn't
even talk to him about it. She said, it's my
private business.
00:10:43
It's none of yours. NARRATOR: Why had
Mahmuda married Amin when she so
clearly was besotted
00:10:51
with her workmate Nasser? She's never revealed the
answer to that question. Perhaps Nasser didn't fit
in with her parents plans.
00:10:58
He was a Muslim, but from
a Pakistani background. His family and community
would, in all likelihood,
00:11:04
have been unknown to Mahmuda's. JO SIDHU: Mahmuda had tried
every way she could to persuade
00:11:11
her family that she should be
allowed to pursue her dreams, but they were snuffed out.
00:11:16
The family itself
was under pressure from the wider community
to raise their children
00:11:21
in a way that would
meet the approval of people who were
quite conservative in the East End of London.
00:11:26
Mahmuda had no option, she felt. NARRATOR: Nasser wasn't
the only problem. JO SIDHU: When Mahmuda
married Amin Miah,
00:11:37
she tried to give it a go. She made an effort. But within a matter of days she
realized this is a man that she
00:11:43
simply couldn't relate to. EMMA KENNY: Mahmuda claimed
that Miah had objected to her
00:11:49
working and having a career. NARRATOR: Amin wanted
Mahmuda to quit her job, but this was something she
was not prepared to accept.
00:11:57
JO SIDHU: He wanted
an obedient wife. A woman that would cook
and clean from for him
00:12:02
and bring up their children. She wanted balance. She wanted fairness. She wanted a life in which
both she and her husband
00:12:08
could respect each other. But it was only a few
days before she realized that was just a pipe dream.
00:12:15
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: It was clear
that in the very short time that the couple
had been married,
00:12:19
things were already
going horribly wrong. NARRATOR: But she'd
made her choice. She'd married Amin.
00:12:27
And now she had
to see it through. JO SIDHU: Mahmuda had no option. EMMA KENNY: She'd already
failed in one marriage, which
00:12:33
means she was a much
higher statistic anyway to fail in a second. JO SIDHU: And there
was nothing else
00:12:38
that she felt she could do
because no second divorce would be accepted. NARRATOR: Would Mahmuda
learn to put aside
00:12:44
her ambitions and her desires? It seemed to be her only choice. EMMA KENNY: It's sad to think
that the most important thing
00:12:52
for her was finding somebody
that she may grow to love, because it suggests
that she felt
00:12:57
that there was no other option. JO SIDHU: Mahmuda felt tormented
about this second marriage.
00:13:02
It was a big mistake. She should have said no. NARRATOR:
Bangladeshi-born Amin Miah
00:13:17
thought that he'd
found his life partner in his new wife Mahmuda Khatun. Their East London wedding was a
cause for hope and celebration
00:13:25
for both of their families. But just a month into their
marriage, tragedy strikes.
00:13:30
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
The couple had only been married for
four weeks, when the police were called
to a flat in Bethnal
00:13:36
Green on the 9th of August. PETER BLEKSLEY: The police
received a phone call. She was claiming that she
was locked out of her flat
00:13:44
but that she could smell
something burning on the stove. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: She'd
left her keys at work.
00:13:51
She couldn't get into the flat. And she couldn't get
hold of her husband. Worse, she'd looked
through the letterbox
00:13:57
and seen blood on the walls. JO SIDHU: Mahmuda
contacted her two brothers and told them that she
needed their help because she
00:14:05
couldn't get into her flat. The brothers came. They tried to help her. NARRATOR: When police
arrived at Hadleigh House,
00:14:11
Mahmuda was
panic-stricken, distraught. Her brothers were
almost as distressed. The siblings had
apparently just made
00:14:18
a horrific discovery
that confirmed their worst fears for Amin. This is the story they told.
00:14:24
JO SIDHU: All three looked
through the letterbox, and they saw Amin's body lying
in the hallway blood-soaked.
00:14:30
There was blood everywhere. NARRATOR: The flat was silent. Mahmuda and her brothers could
see that Amin wasn't moving.
00:14:39
Arcs of blood
covered the ceiling in the walls of the hallway. PETER BLEKSLEY: When the
police arrived they couldn't
00:14:44
get through the door either. So they called the fire brigade. And they forced the door open.
00:14:49
And what they found was
Miah dead on the floor with a knife wound. PETER BLEKSLEY: He'd been
stabbed once in the chest.
00:14:59
The television remote
control was near to his hand. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
He'd clearly been
00:15:05
disturbed watching television. This was an attack
that was brutal and came out of the blue.
00:15:11
JO SIDHU: The body was lying
there where it had fallen. The paramedics
came in but it was
00:15:14
clear that life was extinct. There was nothing they
could do to save his life because he was already gone.
00:15:21
NARRATOR: A bride for just
33 days, Mahmuda Khatun was now a widow. It looked like her husband had
been taken from her in an act
00:15:29
of ferocious violence. The police immediately
believe that Khatun is innocent. That she's not a victim.
00:15:36
That she is the grieving widow. And she plays the
part admirably. She does a really good job.
00:15:41
JO SIDHU: The police had no
reason at that stage to suspect that she was behind it.
00:15:46
After all, she was a
diminutive young woman. And there was nothing
about her or history
00:15:50
that suggests that she
had a violent temperament. She has an excellent alibi. And she seems to be
an individual who had
00:15:56
no reason to kill her husband. So people treat
her with real care. JO SIDHU: The police
looked at her as someone
00:16:05
who might help their inquiry. They spoke to her about her
movements and the last time
00:16:09
that she'd seen her husband. She came up with the story
that she was elsewhere. She told them she had no idea
what had happened or why.
00:16:16
PETER BLEKSLEY: She
told them that she'd been in Liverpool Street,
another part of East London,
00:16:22
for some hours before
returning to the flat, not being able to get in,
and then calling the police.
00:16:30
NARRATOR: At first, Mahmuda's
story seemed to stack up. What she said was
that after work, she'd
00:16:35
traveled to Liverpool
Street and gone to visit a friend at the
hostel that she'd moved
00:16:40
out of just a few weeks before. PETER BLEKSLEY: To
corroborate her story, Mahmuda gave the
name of a friend
00:16:46
that she said she had been
with from half past 7:00 until about half past 10:00.
00:16:53
Khatun's alibi is given
by her friend Slava Cheema. And what she suggests
is that she's been
00:16:59
with her the whole evening. An hour at least, which is
when the crime was committed.
00:17:04
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: The two
had talked for around an hour that evening before Mahmuda
had taken a cab back to Bethnal
00:17:10
Green to see her husband. NARRATOR: According
to Mahmuda, she hadn't originally planned to
return to her marital home
00:17:17
that evening. But then it had a
change of heart. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: She'd been
at work until 7:00 PM that day
00:17:23
and then had let her
mother know that she was planning to go back
to the family home
00:17:27
and spend the night there. This was something
that was not unusual either for her or for the
culture that they lived in.
00:17:34
But her mother had reminded
her that it was Miraj night, a special night for
prayer, and that she should
00:17:39
really be with her husband. NARRATOR: Lailat al Miraj is
an annual religious holiday
00:17:46
which many Muslims mark with
prayers and a shared meal. As a devout man there
was little doubt
00:17:51
Amin would want to celebrate
such an important day. In fact, when he returned from
work that evening at 7:30,
00:17:57
he'd gone straight
back out to the mosque. Returning home just
before 9:00 PM. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: So later
that evening, she then
00:18:05
sent another text message to her
brother saying, mom was right. I should be back
with my husband.
00:18:11
It's Miraj night. We should be praying together. NARRATOR: Mahmuda tells
police that she had then bid
00:18:16
goodbye to her friend Slava
and taken a taxi from Liverpool Street to Bethnal Green.
00:18:22
On arriving at Hadleigh
House, she realized that she didn't have her keys. And that was when her
alleged nightmare had begun.
00:18:29
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
She couldn't get into the flat that she shared
with her brand new husband.
00:18:34
She couldn't get hold
of him on the phone. The door was locked. And what was worse, she
could smell burning.
00:18:39
She was in fear for
her husband's life. PETER BLEKSLEY: When
the police entered the flat they found
Mahmuda's husband,
00:18:46
Muhammad, lying
dead on the floor. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
And it's then that she enters into this play-acting
of the distressed widow.
00:18:55
NARRATORS: Detectives were
baffled they couldn't find anyone with a bad word
to say about Mohammad
00:18:59
Amin Miah, let alone someone
with an axe to grind. PETER BLEKSLEY: Everybody
appeared to have
00:19:04
the same opinion of Muhammad. He was quiet, gentle,
a hard working man, and nobody could
think of a reason
00:19:14
why anybody would
want to murder him. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
The police were left scratching their head.
00:19:21
He was an upstanding
member of the community. Miah, who regularly prayed
at the local mosque,
00:19:27
helped out in the community. Had a good job. Got on well with friends
and family, neighbors.
00:19:33
The door was locked. Who on Earth could have done
this terrible thing to a man who seemingly had no enemies?
00:19:40
NARRATOR: Often, in
murder investigations the first person
to be questioned is a victim's spouse.
00:19:47
The person closest
to him or her. PETER BLEKSLEY: They'd want to
know whether she was at home.
00:19:52
Whether she heard anything. Whether there was any
problem that her husband had with any third party.
00:19:56
NARRATOR: Mahmuda had clearly
anticipated their questions. She had an answer
for everything.
00:20:01
But Peter Bleksley,
a former detective with London's
Metropolitan Police force, knows only too well
that a good copper
00:20:07
takes nothing at face value. PETER BLEKSLEY: There's
the ABC of detective world.
00:20:13
A, accept nothing. B, believe nothing. And C, challenge everything. But despite Mahmuda's
convincing portrayal
00:20:22
as the grief-stricken
widow, something didn't add up with her story. The police eventually
did challenge her story.
00:20:31
And that of course, is
when it started to unravel. NARRATOR: New bride,
Mahmuda Khatun,
00:20:45
tells detectives
that she's devastated by the murder of her
husband, Amin Miah, just 33 days after
their wedding.
00:20:54
She also tells them
that she has no idea who would want to kill him or why. Perhaps, she thought getting
away with murder would be easy.
00:21:02
Eventually, the police asked
her for her mobile phones and she handed them over.
00:21:07
And perhaps naively
she hadn't understood that the mobile phones would
tell a story of their own.
00:21:11
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
One of those phones had been used almost
exclusively to contact just one
00:21:17
number, that of Nasser Hussain. The young man
Mahmuda met working at the optician's
and with whom she
00:21:25
had developed a relationship. NARRATOR: For investigators,
this was the first red flag.
00:21:30
This dedicated wife
now a grieving widow had for months been
in continuous contact
00:21:36
with another man. This contact had carried
on right the way up to the wedding and beyond.
00:21:42
Even on Mahmuda's wedding
day she had contacted Hussain and while she was on honeymoon.
00:21:48
There was clearly more
to this friendship than Mahmuda's new
husband was aware of.
00:21:54
NARRATOR: With this
discovery police believe they had uncovered
the motive for Mahmuda Khatun
00:21:58
to kill her husband. But where was the proof? At that point, they had nothing
to link her with the crime.
00:22:04
EMMA KENNY: She seems to have
a really exceptional alibi. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: Mahmuda
denied any involvement
00:22:11
in her husband's murder. She stuck to her defense that
she'd be nowhere near the flat
00:22:17
and that the first time she'd
arrived in Bethnal Green had been just before midnight
when she called the police.
00:22:23
NARRATOR: But as police
continued to dig into Mahmuda's mobile phone records, they
uncovered a fascinating picture
00:22:30
of her movements that night. PETER BLEKSLEY: The evidence
they found on those phones
00:22:35
completely dismantled
Mahmuda's alibi that she'd been in
Liverpool Street for hours
00:22:42
before arriving at the flat. JO SIDHU: And it was discovered
through cell site analysis
00:22:48
that the phones had moved in a
way that brought Mahmuda very close to the place of the
murder at the time that it
00:22:54
had happened. PETER BLEKSLEY: One of
these phones actually pinged at a mast right by that flat.
00:23:03
Her false story was
beginning to unravel. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: The police
interviewed Slava again.
00:23:13
The friend who lived
at Fidelis House who had been so adamant
that she'd spent the evening talking to Mahmuda.
00:23:21
PETER BLEKSLEY: She confessed. She said she'd lied in her
first statement to the police,
00:23:27
and that they had
only been together for a few minutes, as
opposed to the hours that Mahmuda had claimed.
00:23:35
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: She
was quick to point out that she hadn't done
this through any desire
00:23:40
to cover up a crime. She had firmly believed
that Mahmuda was innocent, and was trying to
help out her friend
00:23:46
by providing her with an alibi. NARRATOR: Her alibi
not stacking up, detectives had to
piece together exactly
00:23:53
where Mahmuda had
been that evening and what she'd been doing. At 10:30 PM having exchanged
messages with her mother
00:24:02
about Miraj night, she
texted her husband. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: She
says, "I'm coming over.
00:24:08
Don't go to sleep." NARRATOR: According to Mahmuda's
first account to the police,
00:24:12
at that point she'd taken
a cab from Liverpool Street to Bethnal Green arriving
at Hadleigh House around 11
00:24:19
o'clock in the evening
only to discover that she couldn't get in. In fact, this wasn't Mahmuda's
first trip to her marital home
00:24:26
that evening. She traveled there
earlier via cab. PETER BLEKSLEY:
One of the phones
00:24:31
that Mahmuda had handed to
the police, detectives found the telephone number of
a minicab company that
00:24:37
had been called in the hours
before Muhammad's murder. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
She had booked
00:24:43
a minicab to take her
from Fidelis House to Bethnal Green at 9:00 PM. Some three hours before
the time she allegedly
00:24:51
arrived at the house to
discover that her husband had been murdered. PETER BLEKSLEY: They
traced the minicab driver.
00:25:03
And he said he'd taken a fare,
a woman from Liverpool Street, to the flat that
Mahmuda and Muhammad
00:25:10
shared wearing a burqa. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: Her face
was visible but she was dressed head to toe in a burqa.
00:25:17
Later on, it would
be argued in court that it was this very
burqa that she used to conceal the murder weapon.
00:25:23
EMMA KENNY: She doesn't
ordinarily wear a burqa. But to disguise herself,
to carry a knife,
00:25:30
to get to the flats
without being seen on CCTV in a recognizable way,
she uses her religion
00:25:37
to cover her tracks. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: CCTV shows
a vehicle of the same type as the mini cab
that had been booked
00:25:44
by Mahmuda arriving
at the flat at Bethnal Green just before 9:00 PM. They examined the fob
key that allowed her entry
00:25:52
into the council block. And they figured out that the
time that it was used last
00:25:57
was very close to the
time of the killing. She had claimed that
she'd left her keys at work,
00:26:02
but she still had her key fob. And when the police
tried to force entry, they used the same fob
to access the exterior
00:26:10
door to the property. In this way, they
were able to confirm beyond all reasonable
doubt that that
00:26:16
was Mahmuda's key fob
that was used at 9:00 PM to access the property. NARRATOR: Police were able to
build a timeline of Muhammad
00:26:28
Amin Miah's final moments. Returning from prayers
at the nearby mosque, he used his key fob
to enter the main door
00:26:35
at Hadleigh House at 8:57 PM. Mahmuda was already waiting. She had entered the flats just
1 minute before at 8:56 PM.
00:26:45
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: She used her
key fob to access the exterior door of the property.
00:26:50
And then it seems she waited
somewhere between the exterior door and the flat itself.
00:26:57
That's the moment at which
she called her husband to see where he was. NARRATOR: That call lasting 24
seconds was made at 9:06 PM.
00:27:06
It was the last
call Amin ever took. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
Very soon after she accessed the main flat building,
her husband's key fob was used.
00:27:18
At this point now,
Mahmuda has her husband where she wants him. In the flat where
nobody can see them.
00:27:25
She went up to the
floor where the flat was and knocked on the door. Her husband came to the
door unsuspectingly.
00:27:37
And when he opened the door,
within a matter of seconds, she had plunged a knife
straight into his heart.
00:27:44
He bled to death in the
hallway of their home. PETER BLEKSLEY: She left the
flat and threw the knife away.
00:27:53
NARRATOR: At 9:38 PM,
Khatun called another cab and returned to
Liverpool Street.
00:27:59
Mahmuda then began the
final part of her charade. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
She texts her husband,
00:28:05
a man she already knows is lying
in a pool of his own blood. She says, "I'm coming over.
00:28:11
Don't go to sleep." How callous must you be to
set up an alibi in that way? She takes a final cab
back to Bethnal Green.
00:28:21
And it's at this
point that she then embarks on this play-acting. This-- this role of the bereaved
widow that she plays that
00:28:29
is convincing enough that
the police believe her. NARRATOR: Detectives
weren't taken in for long.
00:28:35
JO SIDHU: The police
became convinced that they'd found their
murderer in Mahmuda Khatun.
00:28:39
But her lies were no
match for technology. And in this case, CCTV, phone
records, and the key fob
00:28:47
records showed
that she was firmly at the scene of the crime. JO SIDHU: Once the
evidential trail
00:28:55
took the police directly
to Mahmuda Khatun, they got her back in. This time as a suspect.
00:29:01
She was arrested for the
murder of her husband. When she got into the
interrogation with the police,
00:29:06
she closed up. She refused to answer questions. The police put the
evidence to her.
00:29:11
But she had nothing
to say in response. And on the 20th
of September, 2007, Mahmuda was charged with
murder and remanded in custody.
00:29:20
She continued to
stick to her defense and wouldn't give
any more information, until the following
year when her case
00:29:28
was prepared for trial. NARRATOR: The circumstantial
evidence against Mahmuda was substantial, but was
it enough to convict her
00:29:37
of murder? Only two people knew
exactly what had happened in the hallway of Mahmuda and
Amin's flat, and one of them
00:29:44
was dead. PETER BLEKSLEY: Whilst
she sat in her prison cell probably poring over the
considerable evidence that
00:29:53
was against her, I
suspect she decided, I better come up
with the defense that will fit the circumstances.
00:30:01
EMMA KENNY: In certain
domestic violence situations we know that women and men
have killed their partners
00:30:07
defending themselves. PETER BLEKSLEY: A few
weeks before the murder trial is due to start
Mahmuda changes tack.
00:30:16
She now says, yes,
I did kill him. But says that she was
subjected to a torrent of physical and verbal abuse.
00:30:38
JO SIDHU: When I first
met Mahmuda Khatun it was in a women's prison. NARRATOR: Jo Sidhu,
a lawyer experienced
00:30:44
in defending those accused
of the most serious crimes. JO SIDHU: As one of her lawyers
I felt a measure of sympathy
00:30:50
for her. When I saw her in
prison she looked like a broken young woman. She was tearful.
00:30:55
She was upset. She was withdrawn. It was almost as though the
whole world had come in on her
00:31:00
and there was nothing
more that she could do. NARRATOR:
Circumstantial evidence was stacked against Mahmuda.
00:31:07
Her phone records, CCTV,
eyewitness accounts, records from the electronic
entry door to the flats
00:31:14
where she lived
with her husband, all showed she'd been
in or near the flat when he was brutally
stabbed to death.
00:31:21
Was there anything Mahmuda
Khatun could do to persuade a jury that she wasn't guilty?
00:31:26
JO SIDHU: At her
trial, Mahmuda accepted that she had lied to the
police and given a false alibi.
00:31:31
She told the jury it was
because she was frightened. She was panicking. She didn't know what else to do.
00:31:36
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
Mahmuda said that she'd been the victim of prolonged
abuse from her new husband.
00:31:42
And that on the night
of the 9th of August, she had decided to
tell her husband that she was leaving him.
00:31:48
She couldn't put up with
this abuse any longer. PETER BLEKSLEY: She
went to the flat
00:31:52
to tell him that she
was going to leave him and she was going to pack
her bags and disappear.
00:31:58
She told the
jury that in fact, on the night that she
killed her husband, she was indeed inside the flat.
00:32:05
That he had come home. That he'd been shouting at her. He'd been swearing at her.
00:32:09
He'd been abusing
and insulting her. That she'd try to fight a
corner and tell him that she'd
00:32:15
stand up for herself. She said Muhammad got violent
and repeatedly punched her. Miah had lunged at her.
00:32:22
And in desperation,
Mahmuda claimed to have grabbed a
knife from the block on the side in the kitchen.
00:32:28
JO SIDHU: She didn't
want to use it. She'd never held a knife
in that fashion before.
00:32:32
She'd never hurt anyone
in her life before. She said that she held
the knife at waist level
00:32:37
in an underhand grip. Telling him, please, stay away. He wouldn't listen. PETER BLEKSLEY: She
said that in fear
00:32:44
she backs away towards the front
door, still holding the knife. Muhammad approached her.
00:32:51
She was frightened. And he kind of,
walks onto the knife. JO SIDHU: It impaled
him on that knife.
00:33:00
It went straight
through to his heart. She realized immediately what
had happened because the blood
00:33:05
was gushing out. She ran out of the flat and
disappeared into the night. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
She turned and fled
00:33:13
the flat having no idea
that her husband had died. NARRATOR: Mahmuda certainly
cut a sympathetic figure
00:33:21
to the jury. JO SIDHU: It was
no ordinary trial. Her brother came to court. He gave evidence about their
upbringing and their childhood.
00:33:32
It came out as I asked him
questions that when she was a young girl she'd been forced
to attend Quranic teaching
00:33:39
classes where she was beaten
if she got even one word wrong. It upset him greatly and he felt
an enormous amount of sympathy
00:33:46
for his sister. NARRATOR: This was what the jury
were being asked to believe. At 21, she was pushed
into an arranged marriage
00:33:54
with a man she accused
of being abusive. At 28, she again succumbed
to marrying a man
00:34:01
she felt little affection for. One who she would
claim in court was also violent and controlling.
00:34:07
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: She
said in an interview, it's as though history
is repeating itself.
00:34:13
JO SIDHU: There was a
defense in law to her act. It could be that she might be
found guilty of manslaughter
00:34:19
on the grounds of diminished
responsibility or provocation. NARRATOR: It was
a convincing tale.
00:34:25
But the prosecution immediately
set about picking holes in Mahmuda's story,
starting with the character
00:34:30
assassination of Amin. There was no evidence
whatsoever that she'd suffered abuse at Amin's hands.
00:34:36
On the contrary, he'd been
keen to make the marriage work. PETER BLEKSLEY: Muhammad was a
gentle, kind, much-liked man.
00:34:45
CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
During the court case, one of the witnesses
was the local imam.
00:34:50
He said that Miah
had been to see him to explain
that he was deeply unhappy in this new marriage.
00:34:57
He said that his wife Mahmuda
refused to talk to him. That when he came to
sit down next to her,
00:35:02
she'd stand up and
move to another chair. She wouldn't eat the
food he prepared.
00:35:09
And he said that she
refused his sexual advances. And in fact, that the marriage
had never been consummated.
00:35:16
NARRATOR: Her claim
that she'd accidentally stabbed Amin while
defending herself
00:35:20
also failed to stand
up to scrutiny. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: She'd claimed
that Miah had assaulted her
00:35:26
and that was what had provoked
her to grab the knife. But there was no evidence of
a physical injury on Mahmuda.
00:35:34
PETER BLEKSLEY: There
was no medical evidence to support the
claims that Muhammad
00:35:40
had punched her that night. NARRATOR: In fact, pathology
and scene of crime reports
00:35:45
seemed to contradict
much of Mahmuda's story. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: The
pathologist's report
00:35:49
revealed that
considerable force had been used to inflict
the single stab wound that had killed Miah.
00:35:56
The knife had penetrated
some 14 centimeters. Going through the cartilage of
the ribs, through the heart,
00:36:03
and into the left lung. He died instantly. Arterial splatters
across the hallway
00:36:10
showed that it would have
been a matter of seconds. It would have been
impossible for Mahmuda
00:36:15
not to have known
that her husband had died the very second the
knife entered his body.
00:36:22
NARRATOR: Then there
was the murder weapon. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH: Mahmuda's
claim that she grabbed a knife
00:36:28
from the block on the
side in the kitchen simply didn't stack up. There was no knife
missing from the block.
00:36:34
And to this day the murder
weapon hasn't been found. NARRATOR: Far from being a
spontaneous and desperate act
00:36:40
of self-defense, Mahmuda's
every move that night seemed calculated to
tell a certain story.
00:36:45
One that placed her far
away from the marital home at the moment her
husband had been killed.
00:36:50
EMMA KENNY: There was clearly
a high level of premeditation to Khatun's crime. Not only because she disguises
herself in the burqa,
00:36:58
that she goes out and makes
sure that a friend covered her tracks. CLAIRE MACKINTOSH:
She asked Slava
00:37:03
to tell anyone who might
ask that they've been talking for at least an hour. She gives the appearance
of someone that
00:37:10
has been there all evening. So the whole premeditation,
then the acting around the events afterwards
demonstrate that she absolutely
00:37:19
knew what she was doing,
why she was doing it, and intended to do it. JO SIDHU: Mahmuda gave
evidence on her own behalf.
00:37:28
She was cross-examined by a
highly experienced prosecutor. A Queen's Council
who knew exactly
00:37:33
what her weak points would be. He exploited those weak
points as rightly he should
00:37:38
because that was his duty. But the result of it was that
she stood there in the witness
00:37:43
box broken and fragmented. PETER BLEKSLEY: But the
jury were not to be fooled. They saw through all of this.
00:37:53
They looked at the evidence. And that was compelling. Mahmuda was quite rightly
found guilty of murder
00:38:05
and sentenced to
life imprisonment with a minimum term of 17 years. NARRATOR: A month into
their marriage, Amin Miah
00:38:16
and his bride Mahmuda
Khatun should still have been enjoying the
first exciting phase
00:38:20
of a new relationship. Though they weren't
in love, Mahmuda had felt enough affection for
Amin to agree to the wedding.
00:38:26
Telling her brother,
she liked him and thought that he liked her. It was a fresh start for Mahmuda
who'd been under pressure
00:38:33
for many years to settle down. EMMA KENNY: For Khatun,
basing the relationship on thinking that she might
grow to love her partner
00:38:40
was going to be something that
always failed because what we know about relationships
is you at least need
00:38:45
some physical attraction, some
compatibility, personality traits that really do connect.
00:38:51
NARRATOR: Not only
that, but Mahmuda seems to be harboring intense
feelings for another man.
00:38:55
One she was not at
liberty to marry. EMMA KENNY: Khatun was clearly
motivated by her feelings
00:39:00
for somebody else. She believed that if she
could get her new husband out of the way this
would mean that she
00:39:07
was cleared to go and
be with the person that she had feelings for. She's clearly a woman who's
a victim of circumstance.
00:39:15
In her culture there is a
strong possibility that she felt completely trapped. She didn't feel that she
could be with the lover
00:39:21
that she wanted. She didn't want to
be in a marriage that she didn't ever choose.
00:39:25
So the chances are
that that enabled her to start having these
ideas about how to escape.
00:39:32
JO SIDHU: The tale
of Mahmuda Khatun is a tale of many young
women from her background
00:39:38
who feel that they
haven't been able to enjoy freedom in the same way as
other people from this country.
00:39:43
But their tales don't often
end up in a tragedy like this. NARRATOR: But what
of her victim?
00:39:50
The quiet, pious man that
she murdered in cold blood and then accused of being
violent and abusive.
00:39:55
EMMA KENNY: Khatun tries to
play the victim card because she genuinely thinks there is a
chance that this innocent man
00:40:02
who has been murdered
by her can be seen to be the predator and abuser. And that's even more
disrespectful because this man
00:40:10
was completely innocent. And yet now, after she's
murdered him brutally, she wants to paint
him as the abuser.
00:40:18
If Mahmuda's only
defense had been, I'm trapped in this marriage. I can't escape.
00:40:25
Murder is the only option. I wouldn't have had any
sympathy for her then. Because you can always
walk out of the front door
00:40:32
and go to a solicitor and
start divorce proceedings. Nobody has the right to
take another person's life.
00:40:41
She had no right. She's now in jail. And that is where she belongs. EMMA KENNY: No matter
what your situation.
00:40:49
No matter how dreadful
your experience. To push yourself past the moral
compass that means that you can
00:40:57
go ahead and murder a
defenseless, unarmed, compassionate partner shows
that there is something
00:41:04
broken within your psyche. She was cold. She was callous. She didn't care about the
harm that she inflicted on him
00:41:13
and she didn't care that
when she had murdered him she tried to sully his name. Without doubt that suggests
a psychopathic personality
00:41:23
disorder. JO SIDHU: Mahmuda wants
to find a way out. And in desperation
she thought, how could
00:41:29
she get out of this marriage? Eventually, she
came to a decision that would determine
the rest of her life
00:41:36
and end the life of her husband. NARRATOR: Mahmuda Khatun was
found guilty by a majority
00:41:43
verdict of the
premeditated murder of her husband,
Muhammad Dilawer Amin, known to those who
loved him as Amin.
00:41:49
She was sentenced to at
least 17 years in prison and will not be eligible
for release until 2025.
00:41:58
[music playing]