An expectant mum plunged 50ft to her death after she was pushed by her husband off Arthur’s Seat in Edinburgh. Fawziyah Javed, 31, died after the incident in September 2021 – but used her last moments to reveal her husband had been responsible for her fall. She had sustained multiple blunt force injuries which ultimately led to her death and that of her unborn child. Today, Kashif Anwar, 29, was found guilty by a jury at the High Court in the city of murdering his wife who was around 17 weeks pregnant.

Anwar, from Leeds in West Yorkshire, denied the charge but after a week-long trial a jury found him responsible.

Judge Lord Beckett imposed a mandatory life sentence on Anwar with an imprisonment period of a minimum of 20 years.

Ms Javed, who was around 17 weeks pregnant when she was pushed, used her dying words to reveal it was her abusive husband who caused her to fall around 50ft down the hillside.

Daniyah Rafique, 24, managed to reach the dying employment lawyer on the side of the landmark in the Scottish capital, where Ms Javed used her dying breath to say: “Don’t let my husband near me. He pushed me.”

The court heard Pc Rhiannon Clutton, 35, was told by Ms Javed her husband pushed her because she told him she wanted to end their marriage.

During the trial, Mrs Javed’s mother said she had been “very worried” about her daughter due to “violence” from Anwar.

Nighat Yasmin Javed told advocate depute Alex Prentice KC: “I said if you feel that you are in danger, just text me ‘I like cream cakes’, and I will contact the police.”

Mrs Javed said she had told her daughter to do so because of the “abuse, the violence, the aggression and coercive control” in the relationship.

She told the court this included Anwar taking £12,000 from her daughter’s bank account as she slept.

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Detective Constable Emma Todd told jurors officers had managed to track Anwar and Ms Javed’s movements in the hours before her death using CCTV footage.

She added: “They were arm-in-arm for most of the way.”

The court heard how the couple went shopping and ate dinner in the city centre before walking through Waverley Station and the Canongate area.

Ian Duguid KC, defending Anwar, told the jury: “As they walk down St Andrew Street, she has her arm through his arm.”

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Mr Duguid went on to add from the exit to the restaurant, and almost all the way to the entrance of the park, they were “closely in each other’s company, physically close to each other”.

The pair also walked past the Scottish Parliament close to Holyrood Park, where Arthur’s Seat is situated.

Mountain rescue staff examined the spot where Ms Javed fell from and where the first impact happened when she landed on the ground.

The court was told that the distance was between 40 and 50ft (15m).

Sergeant Alastair Paisley, 41, a crime scene manager, told the court he estimated Ms Javed had fallen “between 40 and 50ft”.

Lubna Qasim, who gave evidence on the third day of the trial, said she was told by her friend Ms Javed that Anwar was “really keen on visiting Arthur’s Seat” when they were talking at a Walima – a Muslim marriage celebration event – held for the couple on August 30, 2021.

Ms Qasim, 33, said Ms Javed, who was from Pudsey in Leeds, had looked her straight in the eyes and replied: “I’m not so sure.”

She told the court her friend was scared of heights and this fear came to her attention when they visited Barcelona’s cable car together.

Describing Ms Javed as “caring, generous and kind”, Ms Qasim said at the Walima Ms Javed’s mother had seemed “anxious and nervous and stressed”.

Jurors also heard Ms Javed had called the police about Mr Anwar’s alleged behaviour, and when officers from West Yorkshire Police attended her parents’ home she gave a statement in which she detailed her claims of abuse at the hands of her husband.

Pc Gemma Smales, 34, read out the statement from Ms Javed. Towards its end, she said: “I may be his wife but I’m not his possession.”

The document, dated April 20 2021, included claims he threatened to physically harm Ms Javed’s family members if she ever cheated on him; of how Ms Javed said she found herself unconscious in a Pudsey graveyard; an allegation she was slapped across the face by her husband during an argument and claims of abusive language Mr Anwar is said to have used towards Ms Javed.

They included Anwar calling Ms Javed a “retard” and a “bitch”; telling her to “stop behaving like a British woman” and he would ruin his wife’s life if she ended the relationship.

The High Court heard from a midwife who spoke to Ms Javed after Anwar was overheard speaking to her at Leeds General Infirmary on August 23, 2021.

Elizabeth Petty, 41, who was working on the L44 ward that evening, said a patient told her Ms Javed was told: “If you died during childbirth that would be okay. I would be free.”

The midwife told the jury that when asked if that was what had been said, Ms Javed confirmed that it was, adding she appeared “scared” and “upset”.

Teacher Francesca Cooper, 34, was in the bed next to Ms Javed’s and had reported the conversation.

She sobbed as she told advocate depute Alex Prentice KC what she had heard, saying: “I could hear him repeatedly call her a bitch, repeatedly saying he should never have married her, wishing he never married her, and if one of them died during childbirth that would be good because they would be free from one another.”

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