Endris Mohammed, pictured after setting his car on fire in a suicide attempt, was ‘the perfect dad’ according to his wife Penil Teklehaimanot despite the Uber driver admitting killing their two young children
An Uber driver is facing life in jail after a jury took just half an hour to find him guilty of murdering his two children and trying to burn his wife to death in a house fire.
Endris Mohammed, 47, tried to set his family home ablaze after smothering his young son and daughter with a petrol-soaked rag.
He then fled in his Uber taxi and drove 40 miles before attempting to kill himself by setting the Vauxhall Insignia alight.
Wife Penil, 37, was woken by a smoke alarm and stamped out a small fire by the front door before finding the bodies of their children Saros Endris, eight, and Leanor, six.
A court heard Mohammed claimed he killed his kids because he had ‘no money’, he didn’t want to leave them fatherless and ‘felt financially pressured’ by his partner.
Just hours earlier he played on an Xbox with their son during a ‘sleepover’ in the lounge before he callously smothered him and their daughter.
Emergency services rushed to the couple’s home following the blaze on Holland Road, in Hamstead, Birmingham, at around 3,30am on October 28 last year.
The lifeless bodies of the children were dragged outside by their mother who thought they were asleep when they were actually in cardiac arrest.
Mohammed killed son Saros, eight, right, and daughter Leanor, six, left, by smothering them with a petrol stained rag before setting their house on fire
Mohammed denied murder and attempted murder and went on trial at Birmingham Crown Court last week.
On Friday (17/11) he was unanimously found guilty on all three counts after half an hour of deliberation by a jury of seven men and five women.
The badly scarred defendant, wearing a black sweatshirt and a white bandage wrapped around his head, remained emotionless as the verdicts were read out.
He is expected to sentenced to life in prison by Judge Justice Andrew Gilbart on Monday.
During the trial the court heard how Endris arrived in the UK from Ethiopia as an asylum seeker in 2006.
He worked as taxi driver but found himself in financial difficulty after having to pay £250 a week to rent the car from Enterprise.
Birmingham Crown Court was told how Mohammed was arrested at Nottingham University Hospital on 17 November last year
Mohammed’s wife, Penil Teklehaimanot, 37, had said on the day her children died she went to bed with everything normal but then was woken by the fire alarm and saw the flames. Pictured: the house being inspected by forensic officers after the blaze
Mohammed, pictured in a court sketch, had denied murder and attempted murder on grounds of diminished responsibility
The day before the incident, the defendant drove to an Esso petrol station and purchased a black fuel container, along with three litres of petrol.
He then chillingly murdered his son and daughter at 3.30am the following night before trying to burn down the house while his wife slept upstairs.
Jurors heard Mohammed had earlier removed a cooker from a kitchen unit and stabbed a pipe behind so that ‘the gas would escape and an explosion would occur’.
At 4.03am Mohammed headed up the M6 motorway before he attempted to take his own life in a car fire in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffs.
But passers-by spotted the burning vehicle and called emergency services who took Mohammed to hospital with severe burns to his face and arms.
In police interview he said that he had purchased the petrol with the intention to kill himself and thought ‘today would be a nice day to die’.
Emergency services rushed to the couple’s home in following a blaze at the property in Handsworth, Birmingham, at around 3.30am on October 28 last year
He claimed that, whilst pouring petrol on his car outside the family home, he ‘thought of his children and how this would leave them without their father’.
He also feared the flames would lead to them ‘burning alive’ so he ‘doused a cleaning cloth with petrol’ and put to their faces to ensure a more pleasant end.
Jonas Hankin QC, prosecuting, said: ‘The true reasons why the defendant killed his children and tried to kill his wife may never be known.
‘His explanation for killing the children was that they would be better off dead than alive because he intended to kill himself.’
Giving evidence, wife Penil Teklehaimanot described her husband as ‘the perfect dad’.
She said: ‘He was a gentle, quiet man. He’s the man who takes it easy. He took everything easy. He’s not worried about anything.
‘He was the perfect dad. He spent a lot of time with the children and played with them.’
Mohammed admitted killing his children but denied murder on grounds of diminished responsibility and claimed he was mentally impaired.
But a forensic consultant psychiatrist told the court he had been thinking ‘rationally’ on the day of the killings.
Commenting on the case, a spokesman for the NSPCC said: ‘Endris Mohammed abandoned his duty to protect and nurture his children, and condemned them to a brutal death.
‘It is crucial that anyone concerned about a child speaks out, as it could save a life.
‘They can contact the NSPCC helpline anonymously on 0808 800 5000, while Childline is there for young people 24/7 on 0800 1111 or www.childline.org.uk.’