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Man pleads not guilty to helping Daniel Khalife after escape

PA Media Daniel Khalife sitting and looking directly at the camera after his arrest on a canal towpath in LondonPA Media
Daniel Khalife was arrested on a canal towpath several miles from Wandsworth Prison

A 25-year-old man has denied helping former soldier Daniel Khalife after his escape from Wandsworth Prison in September 2023.

Imran Chowdhury of Chingford in north-east London pleaded not guilty at Westminster Magistrates' Court to a charge of assisting an escaped prisoner.

District Judge Briony Clarke sent his case for trial at Snaresbook Crown Court.

The prosecution allege that after Khalife escaped on 6 September 2023 he made a telephone call to an unnamed man who was still in the prison, and that the prisoner contacted Imran Chowdhury and asked him to meet with Khalife in Richmond, south-west London, and give him money.

The prosecution case is that Mr Chowdhury went with Khalife to a cashpoint and withdrew £400 that he gave to the escaped prisoner.

At Khalife's trial last year the jury heard how he used cash to buy a mobile phone to call his Iranian contact for whom he was spying.

The cash also enabled Khalife to buy clothes to conceal his identity, top-ups for his mobile phone, and food.

Mr Chowdhury will next appear in court on 4 February.

Khalife will be sentenced on 3 February after being found guilty by a jury of spying for Iran and pleading guilty to escaping from prison.