SENTENCING STATEMENTS

On sentencing Lord Harrower made the following remarks in court:

"Sohail Ahmed, by the unanimous verdict of the jury, you were found guilty of committing various sexual offences against three women, and of attempting to defeat the ends of justice.  The offences escalated in their level of seriousness, from indecent communication, to abduction and rape and, finally, to abduction, rape and administering a substance for sexual purposes.  Following your conviction, I imposed a risk assessment order upon you.  To explain why this was necessary, I must first set out the circumstances of these offences in some detail.

Charge 1 – indecent communication

In September 2022, you made an appointment with an osteopath, complaining of chronic shoulder pain.  During the evening prior to the appointment, you bombarded her with texts and voicemail messages.  Fortunately, she only became aware of them the following morning.  But she was so shocked that she immediately cancelled the appointment.  In some of the voicemails, you appeared to be enacting a fictitious consultation with the osteopath in which you imagined her making various sexual requests from you in fairly graphic language.  She was sufficiently concerned about the risk that you might present to the wider public that she phoned the police.  When questioned, you denied the offence, claiming that your phone had been lost or stolen a week previously. 

Charge 3 – abduction and rape

In December 2022, while subject to an undertaking to appear in court in connection with the previous offence, you raped a woman in your own flat.  She had agreed to provide you with sexual services in return for money, but although you may have seemed pleasant enough to begin with, she felt increasingly uncomfortable.  You requested anal sex, even though she made it clear that this was not one of the services she provided.  You asked her to call you “Daddy”, which she refused to do.  And when she saw you injecting drugs and behaving erratically, she became frightened and asked to be allowed to leave, offering to return your money. However, you locked the door, telling her, “You’re not going anywhere”.  Over the next several hours you subjected her to a terrifying ordeal, in which you raped her repeatedly, both vaginally and anally.  

In the context of the psychological assessment that I will refer to presently, it is relevant to note that, while committing these offences, you would make comments about changing the woman’s skin colour through insemination, and wanting her to have your son.  You asked her to “squeal like a pig”.  And you exclaimed, “I’m a wolf”, while howling and beating your chest.   After eventually persuading you to allow her to leave, on the pretext that she would return, the woman went straight to the police station to report what had happened.   She was frank about the nature of her work, being concerned that “another girl might not know what she was walking into”.   I commend her bravery, as I do that of another witness who gave evidence of having been raped by you many years previously in similar circumstances.  Your confidence, that a jury would never believe them solely because of the work that they do, was badly misplaced.

Charges 6 and 7 – abduction, rape and administering a substance for sexual purposes; attempting to defeat the ends of justice

In August 2023, while on bail in connection with these earlier offences, you raped another young woman you had lured to your flat.  At around 8pm she had been queuing with a friend at a burger van near Glasgow Central Station.  You approached her and offered her drugs.  The two of you left in a taxi.  Before doing so, she indicated to her friend that she wouldn’t be long and handed him her purse for safekeeping.  She also texted him from the taxi to say that she would meet him later back down at the Clyde, where they had been socialising earlier that evening.  Once at the flat, you locked the door and removed the key.  You told her that she reminded you of your daughter, and asked her to call you, “Daddy”.  You told her that you had already been watching her down at the Clyde.  Her last memory was of you dropping your trousers and chasing her with a needle in your hand.  Having taken a single drink that you had prepared for her, she had no recollection of what happened next.  Fortunately, she had earlier noticed an envelope lying around and had the presence of mind to text your address to the young man she had left at Central Station, in case he didn’t hear from her by 1am, explaining that her phone was about to die.  

When he received that text, the friend tried to reply but his calls went to voicemail.  He decided to go to the flat himself.  Having rung the doorbell and called out for her, he got no answer.  At about 1am, he phoned the police.  When the police arrived, they knocked on your door.  They shouted through the letterbox.  They summoned the battering ram.  Eventually you answered the door, claimed to have been sleeping, and denied any knowledge of the woman’s presence.  However, the police knew from having viewed neighbours’ ring doorbell footage that a young woman had entered your flat at around 21:20 and had not yet left.  Searching the flat, they noticed a duvet under a bed, concealed behind toys and other objects.  When they unravelled it, the young woman’s naked body rolled out, limp and unresponsive.  Signs of breathing were detected, and she was moved to the living room where she was attended to by paramedics.  Later, when providing a urine sample, she noticed bleeding from her anus.  Forensic analysis of the urine sample revealed traces of a variety of drugs, including heroin, that she had not agreed to take.  Her DNA was detected on your penis.  The jury were satisfied that you had raped her, both vaginally and anally.  I wish to pay tribute to the emergency services, and in particular the young man who had summoned them.  His persistence may have prevented the occurrence of even greater harm. 

Reports

Now aged 52, there is little in your criminal record to foreshadow this pattern of extreme sexual violence.  The social work report noted that you continued to deny the offences, and that you displayed highly concerning attitudes at interview.  You were assessed as presenting with a high risk of re-offending, particularly against vulnerable women involved in sex work.  A full and very detailed risk assessment report, carried out by an accredited risk assessor, became available on 30 June 2025.  It is impossible, in this short statement, to convey the deeply troubling nature of the impression you made upon the author of this report.  In summary, he is of the opinion that you have personality traits consistent with narcissism and psychopathy.  These lead to instability of behaviour and mood, a sense of entitlement, extreme denial, victim-blaming, and chronic sexual deviancy.  He notes that your potential for genuine change is limited.  You will likely continue to commit sexual offences if at liberty.  Your problems, still largely unacknowledged by you, are so severe and complex that it may take years for you openly to engage with professionals, let alone respond to treatment.  He concludes that you meet the criteria for assessment as high risk.  A separate report dated 11 December 2025 prepared by a consultant forensic clinical psychologist on your behalf is in similar terms.

Sentence

From these reports, it is clear that you present a very high risk of causing sexual harm to women and that the public must be afforded protection from you.  I have taken account of the submissions made by your counsel, and of letters received from members of your family.  Having regard to the nature and circumstances of the crimes you were found to have committed, the many risk factors identified in the risk assessment report, and the lack of any significant protective factors, I am satisfied that there is a likelihood that, if at liberty, you will seriously endanger the lives, or the physical or psychological well-being, of members of the public at large.  Accordingly, the requirements for an order for lifelong restriction are met, and I make such an order in respect of charges 1, 3 and 6 in cumulo. 

This disposal constitutes a sentence of imprisonment for an indeterminate period.  It means that you will only ever be released from prison into the community if the parole board can be satisfied that public safety will not be endangered.  It is clear from the risk assessment report that a great deal of focussed rehabilitative work will be required before that possibility could ever be realised. 

For the purposes of retribution and deterrence I am required to fix the punishment part of your sentence.  This period represents the minimum period which you must serve in prison before the parole board can even consider your case.  In fixing the length of the punishment part I am required by law to begin by considering what would have been the appropriate determinate sentence for these offences, ignoring the period of confinement necessary for the protection of the public. 

In the circumstances of the present case, had I not been imposing an order for lifelong restriction, I would have imposed a cumulo sentence in respect of charges 1, 3 and 6.  In fixing the length of that sentence I would have first considered the sentence that I would have imposed on each charge, taken individually, as follows:

• on charge 1, the charge of indecent communication - a sentence of imprisonment for 1 year;

• on charge 3, the charge of abduction and rape – a sentence of imprisonment for 11 years, 3 months of which would have been attributable to the offence having been committed while subject to an undertaking to appear at court;

• on charge 6, the charge of abduction, rape and administering a substance for sexual purposes – a sentence of imprisonment for 12 years, 6 months of which would have been attributable to the bail aggravation.

That comes to a total of 24 years, which would have been disproportionate.  I would therefore have reduced the prison term to 17 years.  Stripping out the public protection element of that sentence would have further reduced the custodial term to 15 years.  Halving that period, as indicated by Parliament, gives a notional punishment part of 7 years and 6 months. 

However, I consider that I should also take account of the offending in charge 7 when fixing the final punishment part.  On charge 7, the charge of attempting to defeat the ends of justice, I impose a concurrent sentence of imprisonment for 3 years, 3 months of which are attributed to the bail aggravation.  That sentence is backdated to 8 August 2023 when you were first remanded in custody in connection with these proceedings.  To take account of that offence, the punishment part will be 9 years, also backdated to 8 August 2023.  Three months of that period will be attributed to the aggravations in charges 3 and 6.

But I must emphasise that this does not mean that you will be released automatically at the end of the 9 year period.  Nor does it in any sense reflect any view I might have as to when you ought to be released.  It simply means that until that period has elapsed you cannot ask to be considered for parole. Even after the period comes to an end, your date of release will depend on the view that the parole board takes of the risks to public safety which you pose when it considers your case. 

In respect of charges 1, 3, and 6, you will remain subject to the notification provisions of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 for an indefinite period as that term is defined in the legislation.

I also make non-harassment orders, in terms of which you will not approach, contact, or attempt to approach or contact, in any way whatsoever, and either directly or indirectly, the three complainers named in the charges on the indictment, those orders to subsist for an indefinite period.