"her acknowledged immaturity were given far too little weight"
TikTok influencer Mahek Bukhari, who murdered her mother’s lover and his friend in a high-speed car chase, has had her jail sentence reduced by the Court of Appeal.
Bukhari was originally jailed for a minimum of 31 years and eight months in September 2023 for her role in the murders of Saqib Hussain and Hashim Ijazuddin, both 21, in February 2022.
On October 24, 2025, appeal judges cut the term to 26 years and 285 days, ruling that her young age had not been properly considered at sentencing.
Reading a summary of the ruling in court, Lord Justice Warby said: “The judge did not make enough allowance for the fact that this appellant [Mahek Bukhari] was an immature 22-year-old at the time of these offences.”
Bukhari and her mother, Ansreen, were among seven people convicted over the deaths, which prosecutors described as a “revenge” killing following a failed affair.
The trial heard that Ansreen Bukhari had tried to end her relationship with Mr Hussain, who then threatened to release a sextape of her unless she paid him £3,000.
Prosecutors said Mr Hussain and Mr Ijazuddin, from Banbury in Oxfordshire, were “lured” to “one last meeting” in a Tesco car park in Hamilton, Leicester, under the pretence of collecting the money.
Instead, they were ambushed and chased along the A46 in Leicester by two cars driven by the Bukharis and their associates, before being rammed off the road.
Both victims were killed instantly when their car burst into flames.
At the appeal hearing in London, Mahek’s barrister, Christopher Millington KC, argued that her “age and lack of maturity” should have led to a shorter sentence.
He said that before the Bukharis travelled from their home near Stoke-on-Trent to Leicester, Mr Hussain had threatened to release explicit content unless his demands were met.
However, Lord Justice Warby said Mahek’s response to the blackmail was “disproportionate” and added that it was “hard to see any real link between any of Saqib’s behaviour and the events on the A46 that led to his death”.
Despite this, the judge concluded that Mahek’s “youth and her acknowledged immaturity were given far too little weight”, which should have “exerted a substantial downward pressure on the minimum term”.
Alongside TikTok content creator Mahek and her mother, Rekan Karwan and Raees Jamal were also convicted of murder. Natasha Akhtar, Ameer Jamal and Sanaf Gulamustafa were jailed for manslaughter.
Akhtar was sentenced to 11 years and eight months, Ameer Jamal to 14 years and eight months, and Gulamustafa to 14 years and nine months.
The Court of Appeal also reduced those sentences after ruling they were excessive.
Jamal’s term was cut to 12 years and eight months, Gulamustafa’s to 12 years and nine months, and Akhtar’s to nine years and eight months.
Lord Justice Warby, sitting with Mr Justice Lavender and Judge Sylvia De Bertodano, said:
“It seems to us indisputable that the car chase carried a high risk of death or really serious harm and that this should have been obvious to all those in each car.”
But he added that the “minor role played by each” of the three defendants “should have had a powerful downward impact” on their sentences.
He said: “In our view, the judge erred in striking the overall balance of aggravation and mitigation. The sentences for all these appellants were manifestly excessive.
“They could and should have been substantially lower.”
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