Attack victim 'joking' before death

5:26pm Wednesday 14th May 2008

A Bradford student beaten to death with a cricket bat was laughing and joking on the phone minutes beforehand, a murder trial jury heard.

Nazeer Ahmed, 22, asked fellow student Nizam Uddin, who was on holiday in Poland: "How the girls were?".

Mr Uddin, a business administration student at Yorkshire College, Manningham Lane, Bradford, was on the beach when his friend rang.

Mr Uddin told police: "Nazeer asked how I was and what I was doing. I told him that I was on the beach and we laughed and joked as Nazir was asking how the birds were.

"We shared a joke about how he wished he was there with me."

The jury heard that the call was made at 2.09pm on May 31 last year.

The court heard Mr Ahmed, who was battered to death while eating a meal at his home in Rupert Street, Keighley, was killed between 2.33pm, when he sent a text message, and 3.45pm.

Illegal immigrant Dawood Khan, one of five men sharing the house, denies Mr Ahmed's murder.

Prosecutor Richard Mansell alleges Khan, whose age is unknown to the Crown, claimed he was "cursed by black magic".

He is accused of raining at least four heavy blows on Mr Ahmed's head with the bat.

The student was found at 3.45pm slumped dead on his sofa with a half-eaten chapatti in his lap.

The discovery was made by his housemate Ajay Rajput, a semi-professional cricketer with Skipton Cricket Club.

Mr Uddin told police that to his knowledge Mr Ahmed had no problems with money, drugs, enemies or girlfriends. He was in good spirits when they last spoke.

Rizwan Ali, who also shared the Rupert Street address, told the jury all the housemates got on fine and played cards together.

Mr Ali, 30, a glazier, said he treated Mr Ahmed like a younger brother.

In March last year, Khan went to London and when he came back he would not eat.

"He said if he ate the police would arrest him and there would be a black magic curse on him," Mr Ali said, speaking through an interpreter.

Mr Ali said he and a colleague were working in Bradford when Mr Rajput rang to tell them Mr Ahmed was severely injured.

They returned immediately to Keighley to find the street cordoned off by the police.

The jury heard that Khan was seen in an agitated state in Nadeem Food Store, in Cark Road, Keighley, at about 3.30pm.

He paid £115 to two men to take him to Birmingham but was arrested at Sandbach Service Station hiding in a cubicle in the women's toilet.

The trial continues.

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