Three men and a 17-year-old boy who groomed and raped a teenage girl in Bristol, then fled to Birmingham and later to France in a refrigerated lorry, have been jailed for a combined 36 years. The offences took place in November 2025, after the victim was lured from her home in Somerset to Bristol, where she was plied with alcohol and subjected to multiple rapes and sexual assaults.
Grooming and attack in Bristol
Mehrab Safi, 21, of St Werburghs, Bristol, met the victim on 25 November 2025 while she was Christmas shopping with a friend in Bristol city centre. According to the court, Safi tried to persuade the pair to go to his home, offering them drugs and a place to charge their phones, but they declined and returned home. Safi then continued messaging the victim on Snapchat and requested indecent images from her.
Less than a week later, on 30 November, Safi and Salman Habibkheil, 19, of Lockleaze, arranged for the victim to be brought to Bristol by taxi from her home in Somerset. She was taken to Safi's house and given alcohol. The pair, along with Awal Ahmadzai, 19, of no fixed address, and the teenage boy, all Afghan nationals, then raped and sexually assaulted the victim over several hours. The girl was found by officers at Safi's home after being reported missing by her mother.
Flight to Birmingham and France
The teenage boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was arrested at the scene. The three men fled, first travelling to Birmingham, then to London, where they boarded a refrigerated lorry to France. French authorities detained them and returned them to British police, where they were charged with offences including rape and human trafficking. Phones belonging to Habibkheil and Ahmadzai were found to have been used to search for news of the incident and to research court procedures relating to serious sexual offences.
Judge Cullum, presiding at the sentencing hearing, described how Safi and two other defendants had met the girl while she was Christmas shopping. The judge said: “She clearly didn’t know Bristol well and seemed keen to drink alcohol, potentially with people unknown to her. She would have looked vulnerable from the beginning and I have no doubt that that was her attraction, in part, to you Safi.” The judge noted that Safi obtained the girl's phone number and began an “intense exchange” of messages, asking for nude images on 28 November.
Sentences and victim impact
Safi was found guilty of two counts of rape and one count of arranging or facilitating the travel of a female with a view to exploitation. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison. Habibkheil was convicted of one count of rape and one count of arranging or facilitating the travel of a female with a view to exploitation, receiving nine years' detention. Ahmadzai was found guilty of one count of rape and one count of sexual assault, also receiving nine years' detention. The 17-year-old boy was convicted of one count of rape and sentenced to three years' detention.
Judge Cullum said: “Having been trafficked for the purpose of committing a sexual offence, she was raped five times and was subjected to a penetrative sexual assault by Ahmadzai. The cumulative trauma of these offences will undoubtedly live with her forever and is unimaginable.” He added that the victim was “plied with drink until very significantly affected”, and that being raped by multiple men left her “broken beyond resistance”. The judge acknowledged that each of the four defendants had suffered trauma fleeing Afghanistan, but said this did not excuse their actions.
In a statement read out at the hearing, the victim said: “When I think back to who I was a year ago, I can say that I am a different person to who I was before this all happened. I had a lot more friends, I would go out a lot more, I was happier – now I stopped going out, I don’t even leave the house in general. My dream was to go to college, I wanted to work in a nursery with children, but because my anxiety now is so bad, I had to put a hold on to that dream.” Her mother added: “As a mum it was really hard for me to hear what had happened to my daughter and it is hard to think that my baby has gone through something so horrific, not just once but four times by four men who thought they could do what they wanted to her.”
Detective Chief Inspector Matt Cable, senior investigating officer with Avon and Somerset Police, said: “It’s impossible to understate how significant these offences were. They took advantage of a vulnerable young girl, purely to fulfil their own sexual gratifications. At no point did they give a second thought to the victim’s welfare and the trauma associated with that night will be with her forever.” Georgina Broom of the Crown Prosecution Service said: “The young victim in this case was targeted, groomed, and then lured to an unfamiliar city, miles from home in the dead of night. Isolated and alone, she was plied with alcohol and then raped and abused over several hours by four different people.”
