TikTok Influencer Chased Mom's Boyfriend in Car, Resulting in Fiery Fatal Crash — But Sentence Is Ruled 'Excessive' By KC Baker

A UK social media influencer convicted of murdering her married mother’s young boyfriend and his friend in a high-speed car chase after he threatened to release explicit pictures and videos of her has had her double-murder sentence reduced.

In September 2023, Mahek Bukhari, 25, was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 31 years and eight months in connection with the deaths of Mohammed Hashim Ijazuddin and Saqib Hussain, both 21, during a car chase on a highway in Feb. 2022.

During the high-speed chase, the two men were forced off the road, where their car exploded in a fiery crash, killing them both, the BBC reports.

On Aug. 4, 2023, a jury convicted four defendants, including Bukhari and her mother, Ansreen Bukhari, of murder, according to the Court of Appeal Approved Judgment reviewed by PEOPLE.

Three other defendants were convicted of manslaughter. The eighth defendant was acquitted.

Ansreen Bukhari was sentenced to prison for a minimum of 26 years and nine months.

Bukhari, once a popular influencer on TikTok and Instagram, appealed the minimum sentence, with her attorneys arguing that it was “wholly disproportionate,” the BBC reports.

On Friday, Oct. 24, Lord Justice Warby and two other judges agreed, ruling that it was “manifestly excessive” and reduced the minimum term to one of 26 years and 285 days, according to the judgment.

“The judge did not make enough allowance for the fact that this appellant [Bukhari] was an immature 22-year-old at the time of these offenses,” Warby said in court, the BBC reports.

The violent deaths of the two victims came in the early hours of Feb. 11, 2022, after Mahek’s mother tried to end her affair with Hussain.

He was “unable to accept” the breakup, the judgment states. 

“He wanted the return of £3,000 he claimed to have spent on her,” it reads. “He had three sexually explicit videos and images of her in his possession and was blackmailing her by threatening to reveal the relationship and the images.”

“Prompted by these matters, Mahek Bukhari formed a plan reflected in a message she sent on Jan. 4, 2022 that read, ‘I’ll soon get him jumped by guys and he won’t know what day it is,'” the judgment reads.

On the night of the crash, Hussain and his friend were “lured” to a meeting with Bukhari and her mother in a parking lot in Leicester, on the promise that he would be given his money back, the judgment says.

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They were met by all of the defendants who were in two different cars, an Audi TT, which Bukhari and her mother were riding in, and a Seat Leon, wearing balaclavas. 

Hussain arrived with Ijazuddin, “who was simply to give his friend a lift,” the Approved Judgment states.

Investigators found evidence of calls between Bukhari and Hussain, which prompted Ijazuddin to flee the parking lot, “possibly realizing they had been set up,” it says. 

As they raced along the A46 highway, Hussain called the police, saying, “There’s guys following me, they’ve got balaclavas on and they’re trying to kill me …. they’re trying to ram me off the road … 

“They’ve hit into the back of the car. Very fast! They’re trying to ram us off the road please I’m begging you, I’m gonna die, I think I’m gonna die!”

Screams were then heard and at 1:33 a.m., the call disconnected. 

The car careened off the highway, hit and crossed a central barrier, collided with a tree, and burst into flames. The two “died instantly from multiple injuries sustained on impact,” the judgment states. 

During the trial, prosecutors argued that “the Audi and the Leon had engaged in a co-ordinated highspeed pursuit” of the car carrying the two victims, “which culminated in the Leon ramming it from behind and causing the crash. 

“It was alleged that these were events that all the defendants had agreed should happen, intending the occupants of the Skoda to be caused at least really serious harm.”