Voice analyst gives evidence in trial of man who tried to get false passport after Wolverhampton shooting

Mohammed Maneer Khan, 39, denies murdering two men who were shot in the head in Whitmore Reans in September last year, but has admitted fraud for his failed attempt to obtain a passport under another man’s name two months later.

Duaine Mills, who was 28, died at the scene of the shooting in Harrow Street in the early hours of September 19 and Syed Zain Ali, 32, succumbed to his injuries in hospital five days later.

The prosecution alleges Khan shot both men in the head in Harrow Street just after 3am as they tried to leave in an Audi A4, seconds after they caused damage to an Audi RS6 parked nearby.

He denies two counts of murder, the attempted murder of a third man who was also in the A4 but was uninjured, and possession of a firearm with intent to endanger life.

Two other men, Samir Patel and Yaseen Patel, are also on trial accused of helping Khan in his fraudulent effort to obtain a passport.

Samir Patel, 43 and of St Catharines Close, Walsall is said by the prosecution to have given Khan permission to use his name for the bogus application while Yaseen Patel, 35 and of Bromford Way in Birmingham, allegedly made calls to HM Passport Office in October and November pretending to be the applicant asking for updates.

The prosecution says Yaseen Patel was arrested in a car outside the passport office in Birmingham on the morning of November 20, minutes after Khan was detained inside the building having been dropped off for what he thought was an interview relating to the application.

On Wednesday (October 28) the prosecution called experienced forensic speech analyst Allen Hirson as a witness.

Phonetics expert Mr Hirson had been asked by West Midlands Police to analyse recordings of phone calls made to HM Passport Office in October and November by a person claiming to be Samir Patel requesting an update on the application for a passport in that name.

Mr Hirson explained how he analyses sufficiently clear recordings to identify individual speakers’ speech patterns and pronunciation tendencies with various degrees of confidence.

He told the court that he was given access to “adequate samples” of recordings to identify the voices of Yaseen Patel and Samir Patel.

Under questioning by Michael Burrows KC for the prosecution, Mr Hirson said he had analysed phone calls made to a phone company and to the passport office and concluded the speaker heard in the latter was “highly likely” to be Yaseen Patel.

“In my view they are the same speaker,” he said, although he acknowledged “a tiny bit of doubt” to allow for possibilities like the speaker having an identical twin or the introduction of “synthetic speech”.

“There is very striking consistency across those calls; they are the same speaker,” Mr Hirson told the jury.

Samir Patel and Yaseen Patel deny perverting the course of justice.

The trial continues.