Man killed waiter for 'no reason'

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A man has been convicted at the Old Bailey of murdering an innocent waiter by stabbing him in the back in an unprovoked attack in south London.

Abdinasir Hassan, 21, from Southwark, stabbed Hamouda Bessaad, 34, with such force that the knife snapped in two with one part lodged in the victim.

Tunisian Mr Bessaad was left on Old Kent Road to bleed to death last June.

Hassan, who denied murder, believed the victim was one of the men who he had a fight with in an internet cafe earlier.

'Cowardly attack'

The court heard that Hassan had started the fight in the internet cafe with a group of Algerian men and was left with a bloodied face and "injury to his pride", which prompted him to seek revenge.

During the trial Simon Denison QC, prosecuting, said: "With a knife in his right hand he ran up to Mr Bessaad from behind and plunged it deep into his back with such force that the blade snapped off and it remained lodged in his back.

"Mr Bessaad had no warning and no chance to defend himself. It was about as cowardly an attack as is possible to imagine," he said.

In a victim's impact statement Mr Bessaad's wife said: "His life was taken for just walking down the street.

"He didn't know his attacker and his attacker didn't know him."

Hassan, a Somali national, will be sentenced at a later date.