Manchester Airport Retrial: Jury Failed to Reach Verdict

The jury in the retrial of two brothers accused of assaulting an armed police officer at Manchester Airport has been discharged after failing to reach verdicts.

Mohammed Fahir Amaaz, 21, and Muhammad Amaad, 26, denied assaulting PC Zachary Marsden and causing bodily harm during a struggle in Terminal Two on 23 July last year. Both told Liverpool Crown Court they acted in self-defence.

After weeks of evidence, jurors began deliberations last week. On Friday, Judge Neil Flewitt KC said he would accept majority verdicts of 10-2. Today the panel said it remained deadlocked.

Discharging them, the judge said: "You are not the first jury to consider the case. You are not the first jury to fail to reach a verdict. I don't want you to feel in any way you have failed."

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He said prosecutors would now decide whether to seek a third trial, which would be unusual but "not unknown". A further hearing is listed for 29 May.

The retrial followed an earlier trial in which Amaaz was convicted of assaulting a member of the public, Abdulkareem Ismaeil, in an airport Starbucks, and of assaulting PCs Ellie Cook and Lydia Ward. The current case concerned only the allegation involving PC Marsden.

The court heard the brothers had gone to the airport to collect their mother from Pakistan. The Crown said violence erupted after the Starbucks incident when armed officers tried to detain Amaaz at a pay station.

Jurors watched CCTV of the confrontation. Paul Greaney KC, for the prosecution, said the issue was whether the brothers' force was "offensive, not defensive". He called defence claims officers were "out of control" glib and confected, and said fears of being shot were "detached from reality".

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The defence said PC Marsden used excessive force from the start. Imran Khan KC, for Amaaz, branded the officer a "bad apple" and "rotten apple" whose conduct escalated matters.

Amaad said he thought his brother was being choked and did not realise the men were police. He said he was struck before punching PC Marsden, telling jurors that after a Taser fired near the officer's holstered Glock he thought: "I don't want to die today, I don't want to get shot."

Amaaz said he feared death as the officer gripped his neck: "I thought he is going to beat me to the point I can't breathe and I am dead."

Both denied lying under cross-examination by Adam Birkby KC.

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