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Sheraton Housing Complex Homicide Investigation · Crime Night

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's set the scene. It's exactly six point am
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: in Massak and Sheraton. You know that kind of quiet
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: just before the city really wakes up, that fragile pre
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: dawn silence. It's a bit cool, humid, and in this
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: quiet public park there's just one person moving a lone
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: cleaning worker, you know, just starting his shift. But his
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: normal routine gets completely shattered. He sees something on the ground,
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: something's still dark, sort of hidden by the greenery in
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: the mud.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: At first glance, he sees a young man and his
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: first thought maybe is that he's just asleep, you know,
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: spent the night out. Because tragically, the blood it had
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: mixed with the damp earth, the grass. It wasn't immediately obvious, right,
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: it masked the horror exactly, But as a worker gets closer,
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: the reality just snaps into focus. This isn't sleep. It's murder,
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: multiple stab ones. There's no mistaking it. He calls for help, neighbors,
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: the police.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: Immediately and the scene quickly fills up. Police forensic teams.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: What did they realize straight away?
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: Well, they recognized the challenge instantly. This was clearly a
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: brutal attack, very violent. But the victim a complete ghost.
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: He had nothing on him, no wallet, no phone, no papers,
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: nothing to say who.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: He was, So officially an unidentified body.
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: Correct in investigative terms, he's classified as a Yusa mashula,
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: an unknown person, and this designation, it kicks off a
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: very specific, very difficult type of investigation in this case,
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: I mean it immediately became one of the biggest headaches,
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: one of the most significant forensic files of twenty eighteen.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: Because you're starting completely from scratch. You don't even have
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: a name precisely.
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: You're working backward trying to give an identity back to
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: someone who's been well brutally erased.
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: Okay, so let's dive into this. We're looking at a
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: murder where the victim is unknown, the killer seemingly vanished
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: without a trace, choosing this perfect blind spot. The only
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: real evidence initially was just the sheer brutality of it.
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: All right, So the forensic team's first job on scene
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: is to map out what happened. They quickly determined the
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: victim as young, early twenties. Multiple stab wounds, yeah, concentrated
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: on the stomach area in the back.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: And crucially where he died.
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: Crucially, Yes, the evidence showed he died in that exact spot.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: He wasn't killed somewhere else and dumped there. The attack,
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: the struggle, the death, it all happened right there in.
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: The park, And the body itself told a story, didn't it?
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: Beyond just the fatal wounds?
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: Oh? Absolutely, It suggested a real fight, a prolonged, desperate struggle.
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: He wasn't just attacked, He fought back. There were numerous
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: defensive wounds on his hands, his face too, signs he
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: was trying to ward off the blows, plus a significant
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: head injury.
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: So that changes things. Right, initially, maybe they thought quick attack,
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: maybe revenge.
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: Well, it complicates the initial theories. A prolonged fight suggests
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: something more than a simple execution. Maybe it was wrange. Maybe,
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: as they first considered, it was even self defense against
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: the victim that went horribly wrong. It opened up possibilities.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: But here's where that frustration really kicks in for the investigators.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: They have forensic details about the how, but the who
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: is just a blank.
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: A total blank, no wallet, no phone, zero identification papers, nothing.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: The digital trail, which is often so crucial.
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: Now gone instantly cold because the phone was.
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: Missing, and the neighbors people living nearby.
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: Nothing they canvassed the area, talk to everyone, but consistently
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: people insisted they heard nothing unusual during the night, No shouts,
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: no struggle, just silence.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: Which is chilling in itself. And then there's the location.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: Yes, the location, Yeah, this small area of the park
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: right where he was found. It turned out to be
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: a known camera blind spot.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: Deliberate You think it's.
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: Certain to look that way. Any CCTV cameras on the
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: surrounding streets, they just didn't cover that specific patch of ground.
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: It really felt like the killer knew the area, knew
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: where to avoid being seen.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: So with no ID, no witnesses, no camera footage, what's
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: the next step?
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: Standard procedure, But it's slow. They had to start reviewing
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: all local missing persons reports filed around that time, comparing
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: physical descriptions, height, build, hair, color, anything against the victim.
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: It's painstaking work him for three days. Nothing, the three
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: long days, nothing matched. He remained as Yusa matula. The
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: pressure is mounting, the trail is getting colder.
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: Until finally a potential break. A report comes in, but
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: from quite a distance away, right, Yeah.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: Three days later a report arise from Knatra Al kayria
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  Speaker 2: An elderly woman reports her son Mohammed is missing. He's
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: twenty years old, and.
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: Who is Mohammed? What was his story?
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: He sounds like a really bright kid, an engineering student popular,
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: clearly had a good future out of him. And he
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: had this passion too, content creation, photography, video editing, that sort.
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: Of thing which i'll often require some serious beer.
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: Exactly. He needed a high spec laptop, something powerful enough
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: for his engineering software and his editing work, professional grade stuff.
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: And that kind of equipment. It's incredibly expensive, new.
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: Massively expensive. So, like a lot of people trying to
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: save money, friends advised him to look online the market
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: for used or sometimes they call them import devices.
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: Right, devices that maybe bypass official channels, so they're.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: Cheaper, significantly cheaper, but also riskier, much higher potential for scams,
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: for fraud.
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: And Muhammad had saved up quite a bit.
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: He had around twenty five thousand Egyptian pounds, a really
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: substantial amount, probably everything he earned and saved. And he
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: found an ad online a laptop that seemed perfect at
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: a price that was well, almost too good to be true,
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  Speaker 2: tens of thousands less than market value.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: Alarm bell should be ringing there shouldn't.
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: They in hindsight, absolutely, but he was keen, maybe trusting.
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: He arranged to meet the seller. Wow, the second chariton
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: to do the exchange, pay the cash, get the laptop, okay,
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: And he was careful, you know. He called his mother
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: when he got there, told her he'd ride at the
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: meeting spot standard check in.
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: But then but.
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: Then, maybe an hour later, she tries calling him back
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: and his phone is off, switched.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: Off completely, which is unusual for him, very unusual.
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: According to his mother. He was responsible, always reachable, so
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: her worry spikes immediately. That's what led her to file
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: the missing person report.
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: So the police get this report from Canatur, they ask
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: for a photo.
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: They ask for a photo of Mohammed, and the second
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: they see it and compare it to the unidentified body
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: from the park, it's an immediate match.
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: Oh wow. Just like that, the use of majula finally
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: has a name. It's Mohammed.
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: The relief identification is immediately overshadowed by the confirmation of
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: the tragedy for his family.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: And suddenly the motive clicks into place instantly.
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: It's not some complex revenge plot. It's robbery, plain and
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: simple robbery. For that twenty five thousand EGP he was carrying.
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: The final forensic report also confirmed the time of death
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: somewhere between nine point zero zero zero pm and ten
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: ten zero pm the night he went missing, the struggle,
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: the stab wounds, It was all about that money.
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: But they still have a problem. The link to who
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: the killer or killers was likely on Mohammed's phone, right
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: The ad details the seller's.
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: Numbers exactly, and that phone is gone and his.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: Mother, understandably she didn't have those details.
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: No, she didn't know who he was meeting, didn't have
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: the seller's number or a copy of the ad. So
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: the police are back to a kind of digital dead end.
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: Even though they know the motive now.
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: That must have been incredibly frustrating. They know why, they
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: know who the victim is, but the direct trail to
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: the perpetrator is just gone.
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: It forced a massive investigative effort on two fronts. First,
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: the bureaucratic route requesting detailed call records from the phone
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: company for Mohammed's number, trying to see who we last
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: called before the phone went.
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: Dead, which takes time.
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: Takes time, yeah, lots of paperwork, And simultaneously, a much
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: more manual task they started trying to catalog and sift
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: through every single online ad for used electronics posted around
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: that time, specifically targeting them a second Sheraton area.
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: Wow, that's like looking for a needle in a digital haystack.
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: Absolutely, they were hoping to find a recurring phone number,
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: maybe a pattern, something linked the seller Mohammed met. But
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: it was slow, painstaking work. Days went by and still
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: nothing solid.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: It feels like they're drowning in data, but the key
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: isn't there. And then the break comes from somewhere, completely unexpected.
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: Completely unexpected. It came from what seemed like a totally minor,
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: almost bizarre police complaint filed hours away in is Malia.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: Is Melia. What was the complaint?
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: A laptop trader based there filed a report against a
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: buyer in Cairo, not for theft, not even really for fraud. Initially,
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: the complaint was just that this buyer had refused to
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: accept a delivery of two laptops, making the trader pay
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: the shipping fees for nothing.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: Okay, seems pretty minor in the grand scheme of things.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: Why did that catch anyone's attention?
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: It was the details of the failed delivery the Cairo
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: buyer had insisted the delivery agent meet him in Masak
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: and Sheraton. Okay, that's the area, but.
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: Then let me guess the park.
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: He specifically asked the delivery agent to bring the laptops
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: into the public cark, the exact park where Mohammad was murdered.
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: No way, yes, And the delivery agent thankfully was cautious.
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: He thought it was suspicious being asked to go into
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: a quiet park at night. He was worried about his
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: motorbike being stolen, maybe getting robbed himself. He said the
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: buyer seemed to be stalling, wouldn't come out to the street,
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: So the agent refused, said the deals off and left.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: So that complaint wasn't just about shipping fees. It was
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: a record of an attempted lure using the exact same location.
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: Precisely, the police realized this wasn't just a grumpy buyer.
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: This was potentially the same person or people who lured Mohammed.
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: It was like seeing a dry run of the same
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: deadly trap. The insistence on meeting inside the park, leveraging
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: that known blind spot, it was the critical link.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: So they had a phone number from the Asmaelia trader's complaint.
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: They did the number the Cairo buyer used. Police traced
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: it quickly and it led them to It led them
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: to a man named Hussein, and further checks almost immediately
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: linked him to a known associate, Ahmed.
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: When these guys weren't unknown to the police, not at all.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: Both Hussein and Ahmed were already known for involvement in
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: basically online scams, particularly dealing with fraudulent computer devices, using
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: fake ads online to lure people.
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: So the whole picture snaps together.
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: It does. Once arrested, the story came out Hussein and Ahmed.
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: They operated mostly out of Einscham's. Their whole method was
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: posting these fake ads really tempting deals, often on social media.
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: They deliberately targeted people they thought might be desperate for
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: a deal, or maybe people from outside Cairo who wouldn't
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: know the area well.
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: And the second Sheraton Park was their chosen spot.
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: It was strategic. They knew it was quiet, they knew
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: it didn't have cameras covering the right areas. It was
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: their hunting ground.
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: And their usual plan wasn't necessarily.
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: Murder, according to their confection. No, the standard plan was intimidation.
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: Meet the victim, show a knife, scare them into handing
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: over the cash or whatever goods they were supposed to
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: be buying or selling quick grab and run.
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: But with Mohammed it went differently.
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: It went tragically differently, because Mohammed resisted when they confronted him,
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: demanded that bag with the twenty five thousand EGP, he
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: fought back. He didn't just hand it.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: Over, and that's when the knife came out for real.
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: That's when the intimidation escalated instantly to lethal violence. They
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: stabbed him repeatedly abdomen back during that struggle we know
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: happened from the forensic.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: Evidence and after the callousness is just mistout, it really is.
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: The attack happened around nine thirty pm. Afterwards, they took
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: the money, grabbed his phone, any ID or papers he
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: had on him. They scattered his documents in different places,
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: specifically to make identification harder, to keep him as that
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: Jusa mihula for as long as possible. Then they divided
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: the cash, went home and went to sleep like it
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: was just another night's work.
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: Unbelievable, But that link, that seemingly random complaint from Ismaelia
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: that broke the case wide open.
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: It did it allowed the police to connect the dots,
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: identify Hussein and Ahmed and bring them to justice trial
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: and we're punished for Mohammed's murder.
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: It's a chilling story, and it really does raise that
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: crucial question, doesn't it. We all use the internet now
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: to buy and sell sometimes high value things. How do
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: we stay safe?
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: That's the core issue. How do you navigate the convenience
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: sometimes the necessity of online marketplaces without falling prey to
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: people who exploit that anonymity, who use technology to set
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: these physical traps.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: The lesson from Mohammad's tragic death seems so stark, but
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: so important. Never buy something expensive, sight unseen, from an
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: unknown source, if you can help it right.
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: And if you absolutely must meet a stranger for a transaction,
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: especially involving significant cash, safe he has to be paramount.
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: Don't go to quiet parks or secluded spots.
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: To somewhere public, well lit, ideally with cameras, like maybe
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: the lobby of a police station or inside a busy
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: bank during opening hours, Somewhere public and secure.
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: Exactly. It might seem inconvenient, it might feel overly cautious,
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: but your safety has to come first. Always, overgetting the deal,
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: over saving a bit of time. It just has to