A man was “lured” to a park and then stabbed to death during a ferocious ambush sparked after he sent messages to a 17-year-old girl.
Danish Mansha, who was a friend of the teen and had also been armed with a gun, wanted to “teach a lesson” to 29-year-old Sohail Ali following the string of texts.
Following a trial at Coventry Crown Court, Danish Mansha, 18, of Edgbaston, and Rimsha Tariq, 18, of Walsall, were both found guilty of murder.
Mansha will severe a minimum term he must serve of 19 years and Tariq must serve nine years before being considered for parole, Birmingham Live reports.
A third defendant, Daiyan Arif, 18, of Brandhall, Warley, who was convicted of manslaughter, was sentenced to three and a half years detention.
Mr Ali had contacted Tariq on Instagram on December 3, 2020, with the messages he sent becoming increasingly sexualised and aggressive.
Mansha had seen the messages and he was encouraged to play along with Mr Ali.
In passing sentence Judge Simon Drew QC, sitting at Birmingham Crown Court, told Mansha: “You formed a plan to lure Sohail Ali to Summerfield Park, in Winson Green where you intended to confront him with a knife, to stab him, and to seriously injure him.
“No doubt you intended to teach him a lesson, but your plan was entirely unjustified. You told Tariq of your plan, and you used your influence over her to persuade her to go along with it.”
After setting up the meeting with the victim Dansha, backed up by Arif and Tariq had gone to the park where the female defendant met Mr Ali.
At one point he left the park but Tariq had persuaded him he was not being set up and to come back.
The judge said “By then you (Mancha) were close enough to surprise him, firing the pistol at him several times. It looked and sounded real and, no doubt terrified that he was being shot at, he went to the ground. That then enabled you to launch an attack on him with the knife. You stabbed him a total of seven times.
“The final blow was inflicted with so much force that it fractured his breastbone and penetrated his heart. When the knife then lodged inside his chest you used so much force trying to remove it that you broke the handle off the knife.”
The judge said he accepted that what happened had the hallmarks of “naivety and bravado”, rather than being a cold-blooded killing, and that Mansha got carried away in the frenzy of the attack.
He continued “Despite being fatally wounded Sohail Ali managed to get up and run away. So animated were you by this time that you shot at him with the blank firing pistol.
“On the way, the two of you performed a fist bump, which confirms that when you attacked Sohail Ali you were acting together and that afterwards you had no remorse for what you had just done.
“This was an offence committed whilst on bail. It was a premeditated and carefully planned attack. Sohail Ali was deliberately lured to Summerfield park.
“You took the lead, and you recruited both Tariq and Arif to help you. Tariq was a vulnerable young woman who you manipulated at will.
“You deliberately tried to hide your identity; you had your hood up, you wore gloves, and you had a mask covering your face. You ambushed Sohail Ali. You fired the gun in order to frighten him, and then attacked him when he was unarmed and defenceless on the ground.
“You did so in a public park, in the middle of the day in front of a number of passers-by.
“After the attack you left the park, you did not call the emergency services but instead left Sohail Ali to die.”
Mark George QC, defending for Mancha, said “He made an arrangement to meet Mr Ali in the park and that is the extent of the planning.”
He said that the defendant was very immature and came from an unsettled family background.