Trio found guilty of merciless Castlemilk killing to appeal sentences
A scheming wife and her accomplices who plotted her husband's murder have claimed that sentences imposed on them for the merciless killing were excessive.
Saima Hayat and her best friend Shahida Abid planned the slaying of 49-year security guard Haider Hayat.
Abid's husband Muhammed Rauf (42) attacked the victim who suffered at least 100 hammer blows to his head and his throat and neck were cut 16 times at a flat in Raithburn Road, in Glasgow's Castlemilk on April 3 last year.
All three were jailed for life for the murder with Rauf ordered to serve a minimum of 24 years and the women told they would be jailed for 25 and a half years before they could seek release on licence.
Abid and Hayat were also convicted of attempting to defeat the ends of justice following the murder.
The trio were found guilty earlier this year at the High Court in Glasgow and the trial judge, Lady Rae, told them: "You have all been convicted by the jury of the brutal murder of a defenceless man who was at the start of the assault, in all probability, asleep in his bed."
"He was then subjected to a sustained, relentless and merciless attack with lethal weapons."
"The number of injuries Mr Hayat sustained were so extensive that it was difficult to count them," said the judge.
Lady Rae said she was satisfied that Saima Hayat was the abusive partner in the relationship and not her husband as the wife claimed to a social worker.
She told Hayat: "The evidence disclosed that you are a manipulative and scheming woman. You and your co-accused plotted and planned to get rid of your husband, the father of your five children."
CCTV, which covered every room in the flat occupied by the Hayats, was switched off shortly before the murder.
All three of the murderers launched appeals against the minimum terms imposed on them, known as the punishment part of a life sentence.
Rauf's defence counsel Gary Allan QC told judges at the Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh today that when compared to the sentences in other cases the 24 years imposed on him could properly be regarded as excessive. He said: "I invite the court to reduce it appropriately."
John Scott QC, for Abid, said she originally sought leave to appeal her conviction and sentence, but only an appeal against sentence was granted.
Mr Scott said she considered herself a devout Muslim for whom prayer was the most significant part of her day in custody.
He said for her time in prison posed greater difficulty than it would for many others.
He said she has been exposed to other women self harming and threatening to self harm and to damaged individuals of a kind she had no previous involvement with.
He asked the appeal judges to take into account Abid's lack of previous offending and challenged the decision to impose a greater punishment part on her than on Rauf.
Brian McConnachie QC, for Hayat, said: "There is no coherent explanation, which is understandable, as to why the offence took place at the time it did, why it took place in the place that it did and why the level of brutality was as it was when, then, as now, the court is dealing with three people who had never been in trouble before."
He argued that the decision to increase Hayat's punishment part because of the attempt to defeat the ends of justice and to differentiate her from Rauf was not merited.
"The sentence imposed ought to have acknowledged the fact that the person responsible for the brutality was the first named accused (Rauf) and not the two women," he said.
The Lord Justice Clerk, Lady Dorrian, who heard the appeal with Lord Menzies and Lord Turnbull, said they would reserve their decision and give a ruling at a later date.
The senior judge said: "We have decided that the issues raised in this case require further consideration.
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