Killer jailed for life for murdering Birmingham businessman
Tahir Zarif, 31 from Derby, has been sentenced to a minimum of 30 years in prison.
A man who fled to Pakistan after shooting dead a businessman in a botched Birmingham robbery has been jailed for life.
Tahir Zarif, 31 from Derby, fled the UK on February 8, 2016 – five days after he and three other men raided the Direct Source 3 warehouse on Rea Street in Digbeth.
The gang threatened manager Akhtar Javeed, 56, and ordered him to give up the company’s takings.
While staff were held hostage at gunpoint, Zarif led Mr Javeed from the office into the reception where he shot him in the leg as a violent warning to open the safe.
Mr Javeed tried to escape but was shot twice more at point blank range.
Bravely, he managed to escape before stumbling across the car park to the pavement where he collapsed and died in a pool of his own blood.
The gang fled, but detectives trawled CCTV to trace their movements in the hours before and after the robbery, corroborating the images with mobile phone data and ANPR captures.
A jury heard in 2016 how one of the gang - a former disgruntled employee at Direct Source 3 - drew a plan of the warehouse so the robbers knew exactly where to go once inside. They were jailed for a combined total of nearly 40 years, but Zarif was still on the run.
Detectives worked with the National Crime Agency, CPS, Foreign Office, the British High Commission in Pakistan and the Pakistani authorities to pursue Zarif and he was finally detained in Mirpur on 17 January 2018.
He was flown back to the UK in February 2020 and stood trial at Coventry Crown Court in November 2022.
He claimed he’d accidentally shot Mr Javeed twice in a struggle, but was found guilty of murder.
Speaking in November after the conviction, Lilas - Mr Javeed’s daughter - said: “It’s been six years and nine months since my father’s life was taken by Tahir Zarif. My father has been in our thoughts every day since.
"As I have said before my father was an honourable gentleman. Another man’s greed led to my father’s unlawful death. We are grateful to West Midlands Police for their hard work in ensuring justice is served.”
Det Insp Ranj Sangha added: “Despite most of the gang being jailed for this horrific crime back in 2016, we refused to rest until Zarif, who fired the fatal shots, was brought to justice.
“We worked really closely with partners in this country and in Pakistan to get this result, and I hope Mr Akhtar’s family can get some sense of closure from today.”