An ex-barrister who led a prolonged campaign of harassment against her former lover has had her life sentence reduced to 10 years in the Court of Appeal.
Anisah Arif Ahmed was sentenced in April to life imprisonment with a minimum term of four years, six months and 10 days after pleading guilty to one count each of perverting the course of justice and conspiring to pervert the course of justice.
Ahmed had a relationship with married barrister Iqbal Mohammed that ended acrimoniously and prompted a campaign where she conspired to frame him, falsely accused him of rape and even arranged to be stabbed in a street attack which left her with serious leg injuries.
Mr Justice Julian Knowles said the stress suffered by Mohammed should not be underestimated but that a life sentence was manifestly excessive and wrong in principle. Ahmed’s offending was described by the judge was ‘calculated, sophisticated, sustained and repeated’, and it was ‘quite clear’ she was intent on destroying her victim’s life. But there was no offence which involved very serious violent or sexual offending, and insufficient material which supported the conclusion that Ahmed represented a ‘serious danger’ to the public for an indeterminate time.
‘This was not one of those rare cases outside of the statutory scheme where a sentence of life imprisonment was justified,’ added Knowles.
The court heard Ahmed, who had been disbarred over an unrelated matter, initially sent texts, emails and social media messages to Mohammed’s wife, family, head of chambers, work colleagues and friends. She was sent a harassment warning letter in January 2015 following a report to the police.
She then accused Mohammed of harassment based on two fake emails from an account in his name which she had set up.
She also told police she was receiving threatening phone calls from Mohammed, when in reality she had arranged for another ex-boyfriend to buy a phone in Mohammed’s name and send her abusive messages.
Ahmed’s behaviour escalated as she claimed to have been followed and instructed her associate to send more threatening messages. In 2015 she was taken to hospital with a stab wound to the thigh, days after telling him her movements and suggesting he should attack her seriously enough to require her to spend a few days in hospital. It was unclear who inflicted the actual wound, with Ahmed and her associate blaming each other.
Ahmed, aged 33 at sentence, who had no previous convictions apart from a caution from 2009 for harassment, argued on appeal that the judge failed to take proper account of her personal mitigation and erred in not imposing a determinate sentence. She also submitted there was an ‘inexplicable’ disparity between her punishment and the suspended sentence received by her associate.
The court upheld her appeal and replaced her life sentence with a 10-year sentence. Ahmed will serve half in prison and then be released on licence. She will be made subject to an indefinite restraining order for her lifetime.
