A frightening window on town gang culture

It is a culture in which turf wars over drugs, and the big money that is made from their trade, are the driving force; one in which disputes — sometimes startlingly trivial — are settled with guns and deadly violence, and with little regard for the consequences.

Nasar Hussain, believed to be an illegal immigrant from Pakistan, was an innocent victim in a mercenary piece of gangland justice when he was gunned down in a case of mistaken identity, simply because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The trail of events that resulted in his death started days earlier when a group of men from Bolton and Oldham arrived at Pennine Vehicle Services in Oldham, a car hire business owned by Mohammed Hafiz and his business partner Gulfan Khan.

Among the men was Khan, known as Gogo, and another of his business partners, Mohammed Safdar.

Simeon Henderson, the man who carried out the shooting, was working at PVS at the time.

There was a conversation at PVS involving Gogo in which the men said they were having trouble with a rival gang in Bolton, and Safdar asked Henderson to go into a shop and fire bullets to scare them.

The Bolton News understands that the rivals are the Gilnow Road gang. Henderson said he agreed to carry out the shooting because he was in debt to Gogo for £3,000, having already been paid to do another shooting which he had not done properly.

On Saturday, July 4, Henderson was at home with his girlfriend when Hafiz rang him to say that he would be at his house in 10 minutes.

When he arrived, Hafiz said he had been given instructions by Safdar that the “job” was to be done that day.

Safdar, meanwhile, was in Amsterdam with Tanveer Akbar.

These men, the court heard, orchestrated the shooting over the phone and had travelled to Amsterdam to give themselves an alibi. Hafiz drove Henderson to meet Manning at a rendezvous in Oldham, where they collected a machine gun wrapped in a paper shopping bag.

They then drove to a petrol station where Safdar told them on the phone from Amsterdam that if it was an old guy behind the counter Henderson should shoot the shop, but if it was a young guy, shoot him in the legs.

Henderson and Manning then followed Hafiz to a garage owned by a man known as Lala, where Hafiz told Henderson to take some of the bullets out of the gun because they were needed for another shooting.

Manning drove Henderson to Brookhouse Wines in Eccles and waited in the car while Henderson ran into the shop carrying the machine gun, still concealed in the paper shopping bag.

Shooting through the bag, Henderson unleashed a volley of automatic fire into Nasar Hussain’s chest at close range. Mr Hussain, who was working behind the shop’s counter, collapsed, fatally wounded, having been hit five times and “blown apart”.

Henderson ran out of the shop, leaving the bag at the scene, then got back in the car and Manning drove away.

He took Henderson to nearby Rooke Street, where the gunman jumped out and got into a waiting taxi.

The driver, Akmal Afzal, had been ordered to wait in the street by Tanveer Akbar and was paid £50 for the job.

Afzal drove Henderson back to Oldham while Manning drove to Higher Ince, near his home, and set his car on fire to destroy the evidence before going to his work — as a concierge at the Bauhaus Apartments in Manchester city centre. When Afzal and Henderson arrived in Oldham, two armed police units were waiting.

Henderson jumped out of the car and fled, leaving the machine gun in the back of the taxi.

Afzal took the gun from the car, wrapped it in Henderson’s discarded clothes, and hid it under a parked car.

The prosecution’s case hinged on the evidence of Henderson, who was unusually frank in telling the police how the shooting had been organised.

Most serious criminals take advantage of their right to silence and refuse to answer police questions, which gives them time to construct a watertight defence and prevents them “snitching” on other criminals.

Henderson believed he had been set up, however, and with his loyalty to his former friends evaporated, he saw a chance to get his sentence reduced and made a deal with the police. The jury were warned to approach his evidence with caution because he had made a phone call while in prison demanding one million pounds for his silence.

His account was supported by telephone evidence, however, following hours of painstaking analysis by detectives.

Tanveer Akbar was named in court as the leader of the Castle Street Gang in Bolton, which is locked in a drugs turf war with the Gilnow Road gang.

He is now believed to be in Pakistan and is wanted by police.

The Castle Street Gang is made up of young British-born men of Pakistani origin who live in The Haulgh, mainly in Castle Street and Hilden Street.

They are close-knit, and many of them are related to each other.

Their business is, the court heard, drugs — and “not the odd ounce, but kilos”. The gang has been involved in a number of incidents in Bolton, mainly in spring 2009, the court heard.

In March there was a large-scale fight outside the Fluid nightclub in Bolton town centre, between the Castle Street gang and the Gilnow Road gang.

In May, someone fired a shotgun at the Derby Diner in Derby Street, and a shotgun was fired into the shutters of the Alnoor Keema Naan in Derby Street.

Also in May, a gun was fired in an alleyway between Noble Street and Emblem Street. On June 29, Manning fired the machine gun in Queens Park — the same gun later used in the Brookhouse Wines murder.

It was intended to be a show of strength by the Castle Street gang over their rivals, the Gilnow Road boys, who are based near Queens Park. The Bolton News understands that the shooting of Nasar Hussain happened after the Castle Street gang made an alliance with the Oldham gang to launch an attack on Gilnow Road rivals.

The court heard that, according to the Castle Street community, Akbar arranged the shooting because he believed that he was to become a target himself.

Taxi driver Akmal Afzal, who knew many of the Castle Street gang members, told police: “The reason for the shooting was the owner of the shop had arranged for his cousins in France to come to Bolton and shoot Tanveer. Tanveer found out and organised the shooting and the wrong man got shot.”

Police say there is no evidence to support this claim.

Mr Hussain was standing next to a man called Asif Khan when he was shot dead, and Mr Khan told the court in a written statement that he believed he was the intended target. Mr Khan’s brother Shafaqat, who is from Bolton, is one of the owners of Brookhouse Wines. The court heard that Safdar and Tanveer Akbar had been “slagging off” Shafaqat Khan before the murder.

When asked if he had any problems with people in Oldham, Shafaqat Khan replied that someone had shot at him in Queens Park.

Asif Khan said the reason for the Brookhouse Wines shooting was “bad blood going back a number of years” between himself, his brothers, Rafaqat and Shafaqat Khan, and three alleged drug dealers — one of whom was named as Tanveer Akbar