Harlesden man jailed for his part in sulphuric acid attack on a three-year-old boy in Home Bargains store
Saied Hussini. Picture: West Mercia Police/PA Wire - Credit: PA
A Harlesden man has been jailed for 14 years for his part in plotting an acid attack on a three-year-old boy.
Screengrab taken from CCTV footage of the three-year-old victim (centre) running from his attacker after being sprayed acid. Picture: West Mercia Police/PA Wire - Credit: PA
The toddler suffered serious injuries to his face and arm at a Home Bargains store in Worcester on July 21, in an attack staged by his own father, both of whom cannot be named to protect the child.
Saied Hussini, of Wrottesley Road, denied his part but was convicted with five others of conspiring to throw sulphuric acid with intent to “burn, main or disfigure” they boy, PA Association reports.
The little boy was heard repeatedly screaming “I hurt I hurt” after he was sprayed at 2.16pm in the busy shop, the jury heard.
The court heard the father was angered by his wife walking out on him in 2016.
An acid injury to the hand of Saied Hussini, guilty of plotting an acid attack on a three year old boy in Worcester. Picture: West Mercia Police/PA Wire - Credit: PA
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He enlisted others to attack his son in a bid to win more contact with the child by showing his mother was unfit to care for him.
Hussini had claimed the father had been willing to pay £3,000 to carry out the job.
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The 43-year-old, who tested the strength of the acid on his arm before the attack, was called a key member of the “organisation of lies”, by the judge.
Images provided by police show Hussini and Pulko talking together on a previous unsuccessful attempt to harm the child.
Saied Hussini and Norbert Pulko (right) on what prosecutors called an "aborted" first attempt of an acid attack. Picture: West Mercia Police/PA Wire - Credit: PA
The father claimed he only hired Hussini and Paktia as “private investigators”, while Hussini said he only went along with the scheme in a bid to divert the father from the attack - but this was rejected by the jury.
A feature of the trial was the “markedly cut-throat” defences, Judge Juckes said.
Jurors deliberated for nine hours before convicting the father, from Wolverhampton but originally from Afghanistan.
Adam Cech, 27, from Birmingham, Jan Dudi, 25, also from Birmingham, Norbert Pulko, 22, from London and Jabar Paktia, 42, of Wolverhampton were also convicted.
Sentencing, Judge Juckes said: “Even battle-hardened Crown Court judges were sickened when they heard the news that someone had attacked a three-year-old with sulphuric acid.”
He said the men “spent the night in celebration” after the attack “as though none of you began to appreciate the monstrous thing you had done” adding: “It is an extraordinary thing in this case that not one of you, most of whom have no previous convictions, most of whom with families of your own, at any stage stood back and asked the question of yourself and others, ‘What are we doing?’”
