Rolex revenge killers of this man book life sentences

Five killers who shot an Arsenal fan dead in revenge after one of them was robbed of his Rolex watch are facing years behind bars.

Imani Allaway-Muir, 22, was ‘in the wrong place at the wrong time’ when he was gunned down near a children’s playground in Islington, north London.

Demetrios Kyriacou, 35, planned the hit when his watch was taken and Nathaniel Reece, 40, pulled the trigger.

Reece admitted murder while Kyriacou was convicted by an Old Bailey jury of the charge by a majority of 10-to-two after more than 35 hours of deliberation.

As the verdicts were announced the defendants shouted abuse at the jury while relatives of the victim sobbed in the well of the court.

One of the killers yelled: ‘You haven’t got a clue. You don’t know what you’re doing. I’ve got four babies.’

Darren Dredge, 40, Matthew Hardy, 35, and James Nicholson, 36, were cleared of murder but convicted of manslaughter.

Hardy’s father William Hardy, 71, along with Dean Walker, 33, and Hassan Hamza, 27, were cleared of both charges after the trial which lasted more than two months.

The Common Serjeant of London, Judge Richard Marks, QC, adjourned sentencing the killers until a date to be fixed.

Jacob Hallam, QC, prosecuting, said Mr Allaway-Muir was shot four times in the middle of the afternoon on 4 July 2020.

‘He was lying on the ground in a children’s play area in a cul-de-sac.

‘He was pronounced dead at 3:49pm that same afternoon, about half an hour after he had been shot.

‘A post mortem examination revealed four bullet wounds, one to the right buttock, one to the left forearm, one to the left shoulder, and the last a glancing wound to the left ear.

‘It was the first of those wounds, to the right buttock, which was fatal to Imani.

‘The killing of Imani was, and is, a case of murder, and it was a revenge attack made in retaliation for a robbery which had occurred in which the first defendant, Demetrios Kyriacou, was robbed of his telephones and a Rolex watch.’

Mr Hallam said the killers had met at Kyriacou’s Islington flat on the 6 Acres estate to discuss the planned shooting.

‘Down the alleyway they went, out of the alleyway they came, and there Mr Reece shot Imani Allaway-Muir dead.

‘Although it was Mr Reece who shot the firearm and took Imani’s life from him, the prosecution say all of the defendants are in their separate ways jointly responsible for the murder.

‘When Reece opened fire, Imani Allaway-Muir was in the wrong place at the wrong time.’

Kyriacou, Dredge, Matthew Hardy, William Hardy, Walker, Nicholson and Hamza, all from Islington, all denied murder and manslaughter.

Reece, also of Islington, admitted murder.