A man has received a life sentence for the murder of 48-year-old gay shop worker Dilip Unadkat.
Birmingham-based Sami Salaman (pictured) killed and robbed Unadkat in his own home, the Old Bailey ruled yesterday.
Salaman claimed the victim touched him sexually after inviting him into his home. At the time of his arrest, the killer claimed, “He was not a good man – he wanted to make me watch films. He wanted sex,” reports the Harrow Times.
However, judge Giles Forrester ruled that the ‘viscous and callous’ Salaman, an illegal immigrant from Egypt, entered Unadkat’s Wembley flat on 27 November last year with the intention of killing him and stealing from his valuable jewellery collection. Salaman was later arrested in Birmingham wearing some of the stolen jewelry
“This was a murder done for gain,” Forrester ruled at the end of the four-week trial, before describing Salaman as a “devious, manipulative, and highly dangerous man.”
Openly gay Unadkat worked in the Oxford Street branch of House of Frasier.
The court heard how Salaman’s friend Ahmed El-Shubrawy, 27, was in the flat at the time of the murder and participated in the robbery but was not involved in the murder, despite Salaman’s attempts to pin blame on him. El-Shubrawy is also an illegal immigrant.
“This is an appalling example of man's inhumanity to man, not only to the victim but to the family of the victim,” the judge added.
Upon hearing the sentence, Salaman reportedly spat at the jury. He will serve a minimum of 27 years in prison, and will be deported upon release.