Latest / Crime Night / The Swindler, the Sorcery, and the Shallow Grave: Decoding the Con Man's Fatal Treasure Hunt
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Okay, let's set the scene. It's Giza, December two thousand
- 0:02Speaker 1: and two. Imagine the atmosphere inside the Nazlet al Saman
- 0:06Speaker 1: police station. It's thick with tension, not just the usual
- 0:10Speaker 1: station buzz, but something else. Conflicting reports, stories that just
- 0:13Speaker 1: don't add up. Then an elderly woman comes rushing in.
- 0:16Speaker 1: She's hysterical. She claims her son, Fayez, was kidnapped, snatched
- 0:19Speaker 1: from Sohag, dragged all the way here to Giza, and
- 0:22Speaker 1: then tortured, viciously tortured, she says, And she names names
- 0:27Speaker 1: two local brothers, Ali and Ahmed.
- 0:29Speaker 2: Sebir right, and immediately you know that's a serious accusation, kidnapping, torture.
- 0:33Speaker 2: The police have to take it seriously. But then they
- 0:35Speaker 2: run the name Fayees and the story starts to unravel
- 0:38Speaker 2: very quickly. Turns out this Fayez isn't exactly an innocent victim.
- 0:41Speaker 2: He's well, he's known widely known as a Dutch all
- 0:45Speaker 2: that's basically a charlatan, a con artist. He has a
- 0:47Speaker 2: history of fraud, elaborate schemes, even practicing what they call
- 0:50Speaker 2: dajal and shiwazas sorcery. Essentially to manipulate people, a career
- 0:54Speaker 2: con man.
- 0:55Speaker 1: Wow, okay, so definitely not this simple victim his mother portrayed.
- 1:00Speaker 1: Before the police can even really process that twist, the
- 1:03Speaker 1: Severer brothers themselves walk in Alie in Ahmed and they
- 1:07Speaker 1: completely deny the kidnapping story vehemently.
- 1:10Speaker 2: Yeah, they insist Fiaz is a liar, a total fraud,
- 1:14Speaker 2: which okay, aligns with what the police are finding. But
- 1:17Speaker 2: then they drop their own bombshell, a chilling one. That's
- 1:20Speaker 2: their father. I'm severe He's missing, has been for four days,
- 1:23Speaker 2: vanished without a trace, and they are absolutely convinced Fias
- 1:27Speaker 2: is behind it. They point to this really bitter personal
- 1:30Speaker 2: conflict that had apparently been escalating.
- 1:31Speaker 1: So let me get this straight. We have a common
- 1:33Speaker 1: claiming he was kidnapped and tortured, while the accused kidnappers
- 1:37Speaker 1: say their father is missing and he's the one responsible.
- 1:40Speaker 2: Exactly. It's a tangled mess right from the start, a
- 1:43Speaker 2: liar claiming victimhood and a genuine missing person case potentially
- 1:47Speaker 2: linked to him. So that's our deep dive for today.
- 1:49Speaker 2: We need to sift through all these layers, the accusations,
- 1:52Speaker 2: the denials, the talk of sorcery, the sheer manipulation to
- 1:55Speaker 2: uncover the twisted truth behind the relationship connecting Fayez the
- 1:58Speaker 2: swindler and I'm Sibir the missing man, because whatever really happened,
- 2:02Speaker 2: you get the feeling it's buried much deeper than any
- 2:04Speaker 2: imaginary treasure. To really understand this crime, you first need
- 2:07Speaker 2: to grasp the sheer audacity, the arrogance of Muhammad Fayaz.
- 2:11Speaker 2: He was thirty two and by all accounts, a masterful actor,
- 2:14Speaker 2: a manipulator. His whole game was psychological built around this
- 2:17Speaker 2: claim of having extraordinary powers, specifically commanding gen spirits basically
- 2:22Speaker 2: to reveal hidden ancient treasures, tombs artifacts. He operated between
- 2:26Speaker 2: Sohag and Giza, especially Noslett Alsamon near the Pyramids, prime
- 2:30Speaker 2: territory for that kind of story.
- 2:31Speaker 1: And the details about his personal life are just staggering. Yeah,
- 2:37Speaker 1: they really highlight his mindset, don't they. We're talking about
- 2:39Speaker 1: a guy constantly marrying and divorcing, using women like pawns
- 2:43Speaker 1: in his games. And the most unbelievable part, he was
- 2:45Speaker 1: apparently married to two biological sisters at the same time,
- 2:49Speaker 1: had children with both of them. Yeah, I mean that
- 2:51Speaker 1: level of just contempt for basic social rules for law,
- 2:57Speaker 1: for morality, ye has set so much?
- 2:59Speaker 2: Really does When someone treats something as fundamental as marriage
- 3:03Speaker 2: with that kind of disdain, it shows you there are
- 3:05Speaker 2: probably no lines they won't cross to get what they want.
- 3:08Speaker 2: And for Fayaz, what he wanted above all else was control,
- 3:11Speaker 2: absolute control.
- 3:13Speaker 1: So how does am Sebir, the missing father fit into
- 3:16Speaker 1: this picture? How did he become Phase's target?
- 3:18Speaker 2: Well, the connection wasn't new. Fayaz actually knew Am Sabir
- 3:21Speaker 2: through his eldest son. They'd known each other for about
- 3:23Speaker 2: twelve years, moved in similar circles, and interestingly, Sourus has
- 3:26Speaker 2: mentioned that Am Sabir himself had a bit of a
- 3:28Speaker 2: reputation for frequent marriages, much like Fayees a strange parallel.
- 3:32Speaker 2: But things turned sour, really sour when Faia is married.
- 3:37Speaker 2: I'm Sabier's stepdaughter Amina. She was twenty five.
- 3:41Speaker 1: Ah so Faia's marries into the family. Essentially, he took
- 3:45Speaker 1: her back to Sohag with him, right, but she didn't
- 3:47Speaker 1: stay long.
- 3:48Speaker 2: No. Once Amina got to Sohag and saw the reality
- 3:51Speaker 2: the extent of his other wives, including the two sisters,
- 3:54Speaker 2: living practically side by side, she couldn't handle it. She fled,
- 3:58Speaker 2: ran straight back to Key's, back to her stepfather amsad
- 4:01Speaker 2: Here's house, seeking refuge, and.
- 4:03Speaker 1: That must have been the flashpoint am Saber getting.
- 4:05Speaker 2: Involved directly exactly. He didn't just shelter her, He actively intervened.
- 4:09Speaker 2: And this is where am Seber maybe unknowingly sealed his
- 4:12Speaker 2: own fate. He took Amina's side and basically told Fiez,
- 4:15Speaker 2: if you want her back, you need to provide guarantees,
- 4:18Speaker 2: financial guarantees, specific things, promisory notes, a certain amount of
- 4:22Speaker 2: gold to ensure Amina's rights and security.
- 4:24Speaker 1: Wait a minute, promisory notes, isn't that Wasn't that Fias's
- 4:27Speaker 1: own tactic to control the women he married.
- 4:29Speaker 2: Precisely, that was his signature move. He'd force women to
- 4:33Speaker 2: write him promissory notes, basically trapping them financially, preventing them
- 4:36Speaker 2: from leaving or claiming anything. So for Amseber to demand
- 4:40Speaker 2: the same thing from Fias, it wasn't just a financial demand.
- 4:43Speaker 2: It was turning Fiez's own weapon against him. It was
- 4:45Speaker 2: a public challenge, a deep humiliation. It showed Faiaz wasn't
- 4:49Speaker 2: all powerful.
- 4:50Speaker 1: It struck right at his ego, his sense of absolute authority.
- 4:54Speaker 1: So the motive crystallizes. It wasn't really about amina anymore,
- 4:58Speaker 1: or even the gold. It was a about the fact
- 5:00Speaker 1: that Am Sabir, another man, had dared to defy him,
- 5:04Speaker 1: especially over a woman.
- 5:05Speaker 2: Yes, in Fayez's warped view, no woman should ever leave him,
- 5:08Speaker 2: and certainly no man should successfully stand up to him
- 5:11Speaker 2: on behalf of a woman. Am Sabir had crossed an
- 5:13Speaker 2: unforgivable line. Fayez decided he had to be removed, permanently,
- 5:18Speaker 2: made an example of Now, Fayez needed a plan, something clever,
- 5:21Speaker 2: something that wouldn't trace back to him. He had to
- 5:24Speaker 2: kill Am Sabir, dispose of the body secretly, and ideally
- 5:27Speaker 2: create a reason for Am Sabir to just disappear.
- 5:30Speaker 1: And he fell back on his old tricks, didn't he
- 5:32Speaker 1: The treasure hunt.
- 5:33Speaker 2: Exactly the knas the stage treasure hunt. It was the
- 5:37Speaker 2: perfect cover. He realized he could use the promise of
- 5:40Speaker 2: riches his standard khan to lure Am Sabir into a trap,
- 5:44Speaker 2: essentially dig his own grave.
- 5:46Speaker 1: But he couldn't just dig a hole anywhere. He needed
- 5:48Speaker 1: a location and someone to facilitate it without asking too
- 5:51Speaker 1: many questions.
- 5:52Speaker 2: He needed a patsy, right and he found the perfect candidate,
- 5:56Speaker 2: Sad Offman, a thirty seven year old electrician living in
- 5:59Speaker 2: Nazza let Alsamon. The reports described Sayad as well poor,
- 6:04Speaker 2: perhaps a bit naive or susceptible to superstition, and crucially
- 6:08Speaker 2: desperate for money, eager for a quick way out of poverty.
- 6:12Speaker 2: Fayes new Sayed knew his house was old, potentially valuable land,
- 6:16Speaker 2: which added to the plausibility, and new side could be
- 6:18Speaker 2: easily manipulated. The house itself was key, private, secluded, a
- 6:22Speaker 2: place Fayes was familiar with.
- 6:24Speaker 1: So he approaches Sayed with the classic pitch, there's ancient
- 6:27Speaker 1: treasure buried right under your floorboards. Let me help you
- 6:29Speaker 1: get it. We'll split the profits.
- 6:31Speaker 2: Yep. But he layered it playing on Sayed's vulnerabilities. First
- 6:35Speaker 2: the legal threat. He stressed, absolute secrecy, This digging highly illegal.
- 6:41Speaker 2: If anyone finds out, we both go to jail big time.
- 6:44Speaker 2: That plants the fear of authority. Then the superstition. We
- 6:48Speaker 2: have to be careful, the aye, bad luck, envy, It
- 6:50Speaker 2: could ruin everything, make the treasure vanish. That plays on ignorance,
- 6:54Speaker 2: and to make it all seem legitimate, he brought in
- 6:56Speaker 2: his accomplice, Abdul.
- 6:57Speaker 1: Kadir Ah the assistant.
- 6:59Speaker 2: Yeahs under him as his trusted helper, the guy who'd
- 7:02Speaker 2: been with him on all his previous supposedly successful treasure extractions,
- 7:06Speaker 2: which were, of course completely fictional.
- 7:09Speaker 1: It's quite the performance. He's mixing the promise of supernatural
- 7:12Speaker 1: help the gin finding gold with these weirdly specific ritualistic
- 7:16Speaker 1: demands like needing special incense, bake hour, and even strange
- 7:20Speaker 1: foods for the process.
- 7:21Speaker 2: Right. It all adds to the mystique, makes Sayed feel
- 7:24Speaker 2: like he's part of something secret, powerful and maybe a
- 7:26Speaker 2: bit scary. It primes him to accept unusual events without question.
- 7:31Speaker 1: Okay, so the trap is meticulously set. The day arrives,
- 7:35Speaker 1: the day they're supposed to open the treasure. Yeah, and
- 7:38Speaker 1: Fayez makes his final move to bring the target into
- 7:41Speaker 1: the picture.
- 7:41Speaker 2: Yes. He meets with m Sabir first away from Sayad's house,
- 7:46Speaker 2: and somehow, despite everything that had happened with Amina, despite
- 7:49Speaker 2: the threats, Fiez convinces Am Sibir to come to Sayat's house.
- 7:54Speaker 1: How what did he promise him?
- 7:55Speaker 2: A piece of the action, a cut of the treasure
- 7:58Speaker 2: they were supposedly about to on earth. He appealed directly
- 8:01Speaker 2: to Am SABR's greed. So try to imagine the scene
- 8:03Speaker 2: inside Sayed Offman's house that night. The air must have
- 8:06Speaker 2: been electric. You've got Sayed probably trembling with a mix
- 8:10Speaker 2: of fear and excitement, dreaming of riches. You've got Faias
- 8:13Speaker 2: and Abdul Kadir coolly moving through the steps of their
- 8:16Speaker 2: murderous plan. And then there's Am Sibir, the target, walking
- 8:20Speaker 2: right into it. Despite knowing Faia's was bad news. The
- 8:22Speaker 2: lure of easy money was apparently too strong.
- 8:25Speaker 1: So the four of them, Fayas, his accomplice, Abdukadir, the homeowner,
- 8:29Speaker 1: Sayed and the victim Am Severr. They actually start digging
- 8:32Speaker 1: inside the house in the dark side. Must have been surprised
- 8:36Speaker 1: to see Am Sabir there he.
- 8:38Speaker 2: Was, but Fayaz had a smooth explanation. Ready, Oh, I'm Sabir.
- 8:42Speaker 2: He's our partner. He's handling the logistics, selling the artifacts
- 8:46Speaker 2: once we find them. Keep Sayed focused on the goal.
- 8:49Speaker 1: They keep digging. How deep did they go?
- 8:52Speaker 2: About two meters? Think about that six seven feet down.
- 8:55Speaker 2: It's a proper pit. By then, deep dark, confined down
- 8:58Speaker 2: that hole you're icily dependent on who's up top. Feaz
- 9:03Speaker 2: had created the perfect kill zone.
- 9:05Speaker 1: It was time he makes his move, but suddenly right
- 9:09Speaker 1: not raising alarm.
- 9:09Speaker 2: Very subtly, he turns to Sayed, say, can you go
- 9:12Speaker 2: fetch a lamp. It's getting too dark down here. We
- 9:14Speaker 2: need better light to see the gold.
- 9:15Speaker 1: Ap plausible request completely.
- 9:17Speaker 2: Sayed, still believing the treasure hunt is real, climbs out
- 9:20Speaker 2: of the hole and goes off to find a lamp.
- 9:22Speaker 2: He's gone for maybe ten minutes.
- 9:24Speaker 1: Ten minutes, and while he's gone, theoz is a waste.
- 9:26Speaker 2: A second, he and Abdul Khadir are alone in the
- 9:28Speaker 2: pit with arms. Sibir Faz picks up the tool they'd
- 9:31Speaker 2: been using to dig, a heavy pickaxe. A fast he
- 9:34Speaker 2: swings it hard, strikes m Sibir on the head once
- 9:37Speaker 2: it's instant fatal.
- 9:39Speaker 1: Oh my god.
- 9:40Speaker 2: And then they just pushed the body down into the
- 9:42Speaker 2: bottom of the pit. They just dug.
- 9:44Speaker 1: So when Sayed comes back holding a lamp, expecting to
- 9:47Speaker 1: see gold, what does he find.
- 9:49Speaker 2: He finds fayez An Abdul Kadir frantically shoveling dirt back
- 9:53Speaker 2: into the hole, filling it up as fast as they can,
- 9:55Speaker 2: and whether they tell him the lie quick dismissive. Ah,
- 9:59Speaker 2: bad luck. Treasure wasn't here after all, must be in
- 10:01Speaker 2: another room. M Sebir. Oh, he just left, had to
- 10:05Speaker 2: rush off handle some urgent business.
- 10:07Speaker 1: Just like that. M Sebir just left in the middle
- 10:10Speaker 1: of digging for treasure.
- 10:11Speaker 2: That's the story they sold him, and Sayed may be confused,
- 10:14Speaker 2: may be scared, maybe still hoping for treasure elsewhere. He
- 10:18Speaker 2: doesn't push it.
- 10:19Speaker 1: And then comes the final instruction, the cover up.
- 10:22Speaker 2: Yes, Fayez gives Sayed a strict order. You need to
- 10:25Speaker 2: fill this hole completely right now and pave over it
- 10:28Speaker 2: yahblat al hufa. Make it look like nothing ever happen
- 10:31Speaker 2: in the threat. If anyone sees this digging suspects anything
- 10:34Speaker 2: about antiquities, we all go to jail. Remember, he uses
- 10:38Speaker 2: Zayad's fear of prison, the fear he planted to ensure
- 10:41Speaker 2: the graves stays hidden.
- 10:43Speaker 1: Fayez must have felt untouchable. Then he flees back to Sohag,
- 10:47Speaker 1: leaving the body buried under Sayad's floor secret safe.
- 10:50Speaker 2: He certainly acted like it, because just two days later,
- 10:53Speaker 2: what happens M. Sabir's sons Ali and Ahmed, who are
- 10:56Speaker 2: now frantic about their missing father, track Faye down in
- 11:00Speaker 2: Sohog and what do they find him doing? Don't tell
- 11:03Speaker 2: me celebrating he's having a party for a new marriage.
- 11:07Speaker 2: He just contracted the sheer nerve.
- 11:08Speaker 1: That must have been the final confirmation for the Suns,
- 11:11Speaker 1: that level of callousness.
- 11:12Speaker 2: Absolutely, it screamed guilt. Thees must have sensed their suspicion,
- 11:16Speaker 2: realized they weren't buying the innocent act. The net felt
- 11:19Speaker 2: like it was closing in, so he panics, rushes back
- 11:22Speaker 2: to Giza, and that's when he plays his final desperate card,
- 11:26Speaker 2: telling his mother to go to the police with that
- 11:28Speaker 2: fabricated story about him being kidnapped and tortured by the
- 11:31Speaker 2: Severer brothers.
- 11:32Speaker 1: Ah the preemptive strike, trying to frame them before they
- 11:35Speaker 1: could accuse.
- 11:36Speaker 2: Him exactly, trying to neutralize the threat. A classic manipulator's move.
- 11:40Speaker 1: But the entire scheme depended on one week link Seydaufmann,
- 11:46Speaker 1: the terrified electrician, and.
- 11:47Speaker 2: Sayed was cracking. But interestingly, the sources suggest it wasn't
- 11:51Speaker 2: necessarily guilt over a murder he didn't directly witness. It
- 11:55Speaker 2: was overwhelming fear fear about the illegal digging he knew
- 11:59Speaker 2: he'd participated in, fear about M. Sabir's bizarre disappearance right
- 12:03Speaker 2: after being in his house. The whole thing felt wrong, dangerous.
- 12:07Speaker 1: The pressure became too much.
- 12:08Speaker 2: Too much that fear finally trumped his greed and maybe
- 12:12Speaker 2: even his fear of Fayes. Sayad walked into the Naslet
- 12:15Speaker 2: Assamon police station and he confessed not to murder, but
- 12:19Speaker 2: to the whole strange story. The treasure hunt, the digging,
- 12:23Speaker 2: Fayes Abdul Kadir M. Sabir being there and then suddenly
- 12:27Speaker 2: not being there, the hole being filled.
- 12:28Speaker 1: Everything that must have been the key the police needed
- 12:31Speaker 1: Sayad's testimony.
- 12:32Speaker 2: It was the breakthrough. Sayad could pinpoint the exact location
- 12:35Speaker 2: inside his own house where they had dug and refilled
- 12:37Speaker 2: the hole. Police secured the house immediately brought in cruise
- 12:41Speaker 2: started excavating right where say had indicated. They dug down
- 12:45Speaker 2: one meter two meters, and there he was. M. Sabir's
- 12:49Speaker 2: body buried exactly as the sequence of events suggested. The
- 12:53Speaker 2: autopsy confirmed it a massive fatal blow to the head,
- 12:57Speaker 2: just as the logic of the confession implied.
- 13:00Speaker 1: With the body recovered Sayad's detailed account. The game was
- 13:03Speaker 1: up for Fayes and abdual Caddier.
- 13:05Speaker 2: Completely confronted with the physical evidence, the eyewitness testimony about
- 13:09Speaker 2: the digging they broke, they confessed to the whole thing,
- 13:13Speaker 2: admitted the treasure hunt, the gin, the incense, all of it.
- 13:16Speaker 2: It was pure theater, a deadly play staged for one
- 13:19Speaker 2: purpose only to lure M. Sabir to that specific spot,
- 13:22Speaker 2: kill him and bury him where no one would ever look.
- 13:25Speaker 1: And the outcome for Fees.
- 13:26Speaker 2: He was tried, convicted, and ultimately sentenced to execution for
- 13:29Speaker 2: the premeditated murder of M. Sabir. You know, looking back
- 13:33Speaker 2: at this case, it's such a stark illustration of how
- 13:35Speaker 2: destructive personalities operate and crucially, how they're enabled. You have Fayes,
- 13:40Speaker 2: his overwhelming arrogance, his cruelty, his need for control, demonstrated
- 13:44Speaker 2: so clearly in how he treated women using those promissory
- 13:47Speaker 2: notes like weapons. That toxic core found its ultimate target
- 13:50Speaker 2: in M. Sebir, the man who dared to challenge him.
- 13:53Speaker 1: But Fayes couldn't have done it alone.
- 13:55Speaker 2: No, the actual execution of the plan relied entirely on
- 13:58Speaker 2: the vulnerability of p syite, often his ignorance, yes, but
- 14:02Speaker 2: mostly his deep seated desperation for wealth. That blinding desire
- 14:07Speaker 2: for a shortcut made him willing to participate in something shady, secret,
- 14:11Speaker 2: and ultimately deadly right inside his own home. He enabled
- 14:16Speaker 2: the crime through his own weakness.
- 14:18Speaker 1: Really is baffling, though, isn't it y Fayaz's charisma or
- 14:21Speaker 1: whatever It was? How he managed time and again to
- 14:25Speaker 1: convince people, not just Sayed, but multiple women, even M.
- 14:28Speaker 1: Sagir himself to some extent, to trust him to believe
- 14:31Speaker 1: his outlandish stories. Despite his reputation, it suggests he had
- 14:35Speaker 1: his unnerving ability to zero in on people's deepest desires
- 14:38Speaker 1: and fears and exploit them.
- 14:40Speaker 2: And that brings us to maybe the most sobering point
- 14:42Speaker 2: the sources highlight. Think about the victim, M. Siber He
- 14:45Speaker 2: knew Fayes, He knew what kind of person he was, Manipulative, disrespectful,
- 14:49Speaker 2: someone who had just profoundly wronged his family by his
- 14:52Speaker 2: treatment of Amina.
- 14:53Speaker 1: Right, He had every reason to stay away, every.
- 14:55Speaker 2: Reason, yet he still went to Sciat's house that night.
- 14:57Speaker 2: Why Because Fayaz dangled the possible ability of easy money
- 15:01Speaker 2: of treasure. It confirms that old cynical saying, doesn't it.
- 15:05Speaker 2: Where there's a nasab a con man, you'll almost always
- 15:08Speaker 2: find a tama, a greedy person ready to be conned.
- 15:10Speaker 2: It really makes you wonder.
- 15:11Speaker 1: Doesn't it.
- 15:12Speaker 2: What is that fundamental human weakness, that powerful longing for
- 15:16Speaker 2: something for nothing, that allows skilled fraudsters like Zayas to
- 15:19Speaker 2: succeed again and again. What vulnerability are they tapping into