Jurors took less than four hours to convict two murderers of strangling a Huddersfield child-killer in his prison cell.
The prison inmates killed Subhan Anwar in a maximum security jail.
Gary Smith, 48, and Lee Newell, 44, blamed each other for the death of Anwar, who was found dead in his cell at HMP Long Lartin in south Worcestershire.
They even calmly drank a mug of hot chocolate as their victim’s body lay on his bunk.
But both were convicted of murder yesterday by a jury at Warwick Crown Court and will be sentenced next week.
Anwar, from Deighton, was serving a life sentence for killing his partner’s two-year-old daughter.
Smith and Newell tied him up and throttled him with a pair of tracksuit bottoms on Long Lartin’s Delta Wing on February 14.
The 24-year-old was serving a sentence of at least 23 years at the Category A jail, having been convicted of murdering Sanam Navsarka at Bradford Crown Court in 2009.
The two-week trial was told Newell and Smith were also serving life terms for murders committed in 1988 and 1998 respectively.
The pair are likely to be sentenced next week for killing Anwar, who had received compensation after a previous incident in which he was assaulted by inmates.
Neither Newell nor Smith showed any emotion as they were unanimously convicted after the jury had deliberated for around three-and-a-half hours.
Jurors heard how Smith calmly made Newell a cup of hot chocolate – even sweetening it with icing sugar – during a stand-off with prison staff after Anwar was strangled.
Prison staff were initially told Anwar had been taken hostage because the two inmates were “bored” – with Newell telling a warder: “He’s gone, he’s with Allah.”
Both defendants opted not to give evidence at the trial, but CCTV and DNA evidence proved they were involved in the killing.
Prison officers told the trial how they found Anwar’s body at about 8.20pm after taking Smith and Newell from the victim’s cell to a segregation unit.
Smith and Newell, who were found in possession of property belonging to Anwar, were recorded on CCTV entering his cell during a period of free association at about 6pm.
Jurors also convicted Newell of stealing a watch, prayer beads and a metal earring belonging to Anwar, while Smith admitted the theft of property from the child-killer’s cell.
Anwar had met Zahbeena Navsarka in a mobile phone shop owned by his uncle in February 2008. He was 20 at the time.
There were reports the pair had sex in the shop on that first meeting.
Born on April 24, 1987, Anwar had lived all his life in the Batley and Dewsbury areas and attended Batley Grammar School, where he achieved 10 GCSEs.
He went on to study a BTec in performance engineering and took a first aid course as part of his studies.
A complaint of a sexual offence was made against him in his teens.
Within a fortnight he had left his parents’ house, where he lived with his wife, who was pregnant at the time, and moved in with Navsarka at Howley Walk, Batley.
She fell pregnant with Sanam when she was 18 and gave birth to her on Christmas Eve 2005.
Anwar treated Sanam as his own daughter.
But shortly after they moved to live in Riddings Road, Deighton, in 2007 the horrific catalogue of violence inflicted on toddler Sanam Navsarka began.
By the time she died she had suffered 107 injuries to her little body and all four limbs were broken.
Zahbeena Navsarka was given nine years for manslaughter.
The two cell killers were branded as “cowards” by police.
Det Chief Insp Jon Marsden said neither Gary Smith nor Lee Newell had given any reason for their actions.
“We still do not know exactly what happened that day in Subhan Anwar’s cell and Smith and Newell have not given a reason as to why they visited him.
“I believe they have been utterly cowardly for not giving an explanation for their actions.
“Both were well-known to their victim and there was no sign of a forced entry or a struggle in the cell.
“Whatever Subhan’s status as a convicted prisoner, no-one deserves to be killed in this way and it has caused his family a great deal of heartache.”
In a statement released by West Mercia Police, Anwar’s family described him as a model prisoner and claimed Newell and Smith were “animals”.
The statement read: “In a statement released by West Mercia Police, Anwar's family described
him as a model prisoner and claimed Newell and Smith were "animals".
The statement read: "No family of any person in or out of prison should go through the pain, torment and loss of a person like we are.
"We believed Subhan was innocent of the crime he was imprisoned for and despite his murder, we will continue our attempts for the case to be appealed.
"We as a family are devastated by this loss.
"We have received many condolences, cards, letters and even a collection from other prisoners in Long Lartin. They, like us, are in complete disbelief, shocked and saddened by how Subhan was killed by Smith and Newell."
Smith, of Leicester, was jailed in 1999 for murdering 22-year-old Ali Hassan, whose naked body was thrown into a quarry.
He believed him to be a police informer.
Newell was jailed for life in 1989 at Norwich Crown Court for murdering a woman who was strangled in March of the previous year.
