Murderer jailed after stabbing Solihull taxi driver Mohammed Istakhar to death

A 20-year-old murderer who stabbed a taxi driver to death has been jailed.

Oliver Pugh stabbed Mohammed Istakhar to death in Braggs Farm Lane in Solihull, after boasting to a girl that he was "going to rob a taxi."

Mr Istakhar had picked up Pugh from Birmingham city centre but was later found lying in the road the next morning.

Pugh had stolen the taxi and driven away in his Vauxhall Insignia but was arrested in Worksop, Nottinghamshire a few days later.

During sentencing remarks, Judge Simon Drew KC said Pugh had "no intent other than to kill."

He said: "Anyone who stabs someone in the chest with a large knife as you did can have no other intent other than to kill."

He adds: "Furthermore when he managed to escape from the taxi and from you and run off down the road you hunted him down.

"You caught up with him and despite the fact he was bleeding down the road you delivered at least one more serious stab wound.

"When he collapsed and fell you offered no support. Never did you seek any help, instead you took his car and his car keys and headed off away from the scene as fast as you could, in doing so at one point you drove through a hedge and into a field so desperate were you to get away."

In court today, the victim's daughter read out a family impact statement. She said: "Our lives will never be the same again. We are not living we are existing.

"Passing time day-by-day, minute-by-minute until we are reunited with the love of our life again."

She told the court that her father came to the country at the age of 13, and worked two jobs, working in a factory as well as driving taxis.

She continued, "We barely saw him without his uniform. He spent most of his life working, saving and saving. He built his dream home for us. He was so selfless.

"Why did he have to pick these two idiots up? Why did it have to be our father? He didn't deserve this at all."

Judge Drew sentenced Pugh to life with a minimum term of 27 years, minus the 289 days he has spent on remand.

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