Imani shooting: fifth man is jailed

Drug dealer gets 13-year prison term for manslaughter

Friday, 6th January 2023 — By Charlotte Chambers

Imani Allaway-Muir

Imani Allaway-Muir was killed in July 2020

A FINAL man to be ­sentenced for the killing of an innocent bystander caught up in a revenge plot received a 13-year prison term for manslaughter.

Imani Allaway-Muir, 22, had simply been “in the wrong place at the wrong time” when he was gunned down in an “indiscriminate” hail of bullets fired by Nathaniel Reece in July 2020.

While Reece was jailed for 33 years for Imani’s killing in November, along with three other men, drug dealer James Nicholson, 36, was ­sentenced later.

Nicholson, who worked for dealer Demetriou Kyriacou, was also sentenced for the supply of class A drugs.

Earlier that day ­Kyriacou – sentenced to 31 years for murder – had been robbed and was looking for revenge when Imani was killed.

Passing sentence at the Old Bailey last month, the Common Serjeant of London Judge Richard Marks said:

“You were substantially involved in Kyriacou’s business. You worked for him most days delivering drugs and you got a bit less than 50 per cent of the profit.

“During the trial you conceded that he was for all intents and purposes your boss. You also told the jury that you had some of your own clients. In any event, word very quickly spread about the fate that had befallen him in the ­robbery, so all of the accused arrived at his flat.

“You claimed throughout your trial that the only purpose of this was to check if he was OK. In my judgement that was manifestly untrue.”

At an earlier sentencing Imani’s mother Keetha Allaway told the court her son “did nothing wrong and was innocent”, going out that day with “no knowledge of any robbery”.

In total Imani’s killers have been sentenced to 94-and-a-half years for his death.

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