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The Pound for a Pound Murder · Crime Night

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: I want you to picture a dimly lit stairwell in
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: a crowded residential building.
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: Right, it's twenty fifteen. You're in Collubia, Egypt.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: The air is thick, it's heavy.
• 0:11
  Speaker 2: You can hear the hum of televisions through the thin walls,
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: kids playing outside.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: But inside this specific stairwell, on this particular afternoon, it
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: is dead silent.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: And you're walking up these stairs with a knot in
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: your stomach.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: You're sweating. You're clutching a crumpled wad of cash.
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: In your hand because you're not there for a friendly visit.
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: You owe money.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: You're going to pay a debt to the man on
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: the top floor, A man the whole neighborhood calls Uncle Mabel.
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: You reach his landing. You've done this exact routine a
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: dozen times before.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: You raise your fist and knock on the wood.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: But you freeze, Yeah, because before your knuckles even touch
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: the door, your senses are just completely assaulted.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: It's a smell, a.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: Terrible, sickeningly sweet smell, seeping out from under the doorframe,
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: the unmistakable scent of decay, And in that split second,
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: the dread just washes over you.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Back away, you alert the neighbors, the police are called.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: And when they finally break that door down, they find.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Uncle Nabel dead, lying in a massive pool of blood.
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: It's a brutal, chaotic scene.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: And that moment, that broken door is exactly where we
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: are starting our deep dive today.
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: We're opening up a massive file of investigation reports, forensic dossiers,
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: and court transcripts.
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: Because on the surface, this looks like a classic violent
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: locked room mystery, but.
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: When you really get into the materials, you realize this
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: isn't just a who do unit, No it's not. It's
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: a terrifying psychological study on the crushing weight of predatory debt.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: Our mission today is to break down exactly how was
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: simple financial transaction turned a mundane apartment into a slaughterhouse.
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: And to understand that, we have to look at who
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: Uncle Nebel actually was, right, because if.
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: You just passed him on the street, you'd think what
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: a sweet older man.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: Exactly, he was a widower, lived alone, kids were grown
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: and out of the house.
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: He looked like a retired civil servant just living out
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: his golden years.
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: But that grandfatherly image was it was a complete facade.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: A very carefully constructed one.
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: The investigation files paint a totally different picture. In reality,
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: Nebille was a ruthlessly efficient loan shark.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: He was basically running a shadow bank right out.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: Of his living room, and his business model was predatory
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: on a level that is almost hard to comprehend.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: The documents referred to his baseline lending rule as the
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: pound for.
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: Half a pound, which means a flat fifty percent interest rate.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Fifty percent.
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you borrow five thousand, you own seven thou five hundred, and.
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: We aren't talking about a thirty year mortgage here. These
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: were aggressive short term loans.
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: But the thing is he didn't stop there. As he
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: got more powerful his greed escalated, he changed the rule.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: He shifted to what the locals called the pound for
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: a pound.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: Which is exactly what it sounds like, one hundred percent interest.
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: You borrow five grand, you pay back ten grand.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: How does anyone ever climb out of a hole like that?
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: They don't, That was the point. And he wasn't operator
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: on handshakes and trust.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: Oh absolutely not. The police found stacks of legal promissory.
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: Notes, sign documents he demanded guaranteurs. He had a tighter
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: legal framework than most actual banks.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: If you missed a payment. He wouldn't send guys to
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: break your.
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: Legs, No, he'd send you to prison. He used the
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: legal system as his weapon, and.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: The neighbors testified that he would just march through the
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: streets every.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: Single day carrying this specific leather bag.
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: Right his mobile office. Yeah, just filled with the debts
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: and the leverage he held over everyone.
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: Imagine the psychological terror of that the man who holds
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: your freedom in a briefcase is just casually strolling past
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: your house every afternoon.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: He owned them, He essentially owned the neighborhood.
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: So when the police find him dead and they find
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: his master ledger, this black book sitting on the table,
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: it's an investigator's worst nightmare exactly because usually you're looking
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: for the one person with a motive to kill, But here.
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: The suspect list is basically a local phone book.
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: Does maybe hundreds of people wanted this man dead. Everyone
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: in that ledger had a motive.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: It's a whole community of suspects.
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: So the detectives realize they can't start with the who,
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: They have to start with the how.
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: They focus entirely on the crime scene, the apartment.
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: Itself, the silent witnesses.
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: And there's one detail in the crime scene photos that
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: is just so bizarrely peaceful amidst all the gore.
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: Sitting right there on the coffee table in the salon
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: two cups of tea. One is completely empty, the other
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: is half.
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: Full, which completely shatters the idea of a random break.
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: In, right, because of the social contract. You don't boil
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: water and steep tea for an intruder.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: No, you make tea for a guest.
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: Nebil knew the killer.
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: He invited them in, turned his back to go to
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: the kitchen, poured the tea, and sat down to talk business.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: It implies a level of familiarity. It started as a
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: cordial meeting, but the rest.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: Of the apartment tells a completely different story, total chaos.
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: The bedroom was practically destroyed, Drawers yanked out close everywhere where,
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: the mattress flipped over.
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: It looked like a tornado hit the place.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: So the working theory becomes robbery. The killer was looking
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: for something specific.
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: And for a guy running a pound for a pound
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: lending empire, you assume they're looking for cash or.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: Their own promissory note, right, trying to literally erase their debt.
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: That was the initial thought, but the police cross referenced
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: the physical notes on the table with the master ledger. Yeah,
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: everything was accounted for. No files were missing, so it.
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: Wasn't a targeted debt erasure. They were definitely hunting for
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: the cash stash.
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: And forensics confirmed this wasn't a quick ambush. It was
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: a brutal, extended struggle.
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: Nobil was an older man, but he put up a
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: massive fight.
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: He really did. The medical examiner found he was stabbed
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: seven times.
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: But in the process of fighting for his life, Nebil
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: actually managed to injure his attacker.
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: This was the huge break for the forensics team. They
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: found blood spatter that did not.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: Belong to Nobil, a second blood type.
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: Yes, so now they have a biological They know.
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: They are looking for someone in the ledger, someone Nobill
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: trusted enough to have tea with, and someone who's currently
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: walking around with a fresh bleeding wound.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: But even with all that, they're hitting a brick wall.
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: They pull people in for questioning for forty eight hours straight.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: Chicking hands for cuts, verifying alibis.
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: And nothing sticks.
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: Until a local merchant comes forward voluntarily.
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: This is where the timeline finally snaps into focus.
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: The merchant tells the detectives, Hey, I was desperately trying
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: to reach Nobil two days ago.
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: He called the apartment at eight pm, no answer.
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: Called again at nine pm, still nothing.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: And this merchant, by the way, admitted he was calling
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: to accept the one hundred percent interest.
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: Rate, which just shows you the absolute desperation of Nobil's
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: clients exactly.
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: So the police combined those unanswered calls with the corner's
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: time of death estimate and they.
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: Narrow the murder window down to between six pm and
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: seven pm.
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: The killer was in that room having tea just an
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: hour before the phone started ringing.
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: The net is getting tighter. They have a time, they
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: have a blood type.
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: But they still need a name.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: And the name doesn't come from the neighborhood at all,
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: comes from a hospital.
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: A secret tip comes into the precinct. Someone tells them
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: to check the emergency room logs from the night of
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: the murder.
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: Specifically around eleven pm, just a few hours after Nobil
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: was killed.
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: The police checked the logs and they find a man
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: named Sala.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: Sala walked into the er that night with deep, jagged
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: cuts all over his hands.
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: The doctors asked him what happened, obviously.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: And he gave the classic excuse, a kitschen accident.
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he said he was cooking. The knife slipped.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: I mean er, docs aren't stupid.
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: No, they see knife sols all the time. They know
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: the difference between chopping onions and a defensive wound from
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: a struggle.
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: They stitched him up. They didn't call the cops right then,
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: but they documented that the injuries looked highly suspicious.
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: So investigators immediately pull Sala's file.
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: Is he a hardened criminal?
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: Not at all. He's a poultry train a guy who
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: sells chickens.
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: But his financial background is a mess.
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: Complete disaster. He had a history of trying to launch
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: these small businesses to pull himself out.
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: Of poverty, like the Tiktook venture.
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: Right. He tried to buy a tucktook to start a
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: transport service, which is usually a pretty reliable income stream there.
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: But it completely crashed and burned.
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: He lost all the capital. He was drowning in debt
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: from these failed projects.
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: He was a desperate man, extremely desperate. But was he
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: in Nobiel's Black Book?
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: He was, And here's the bizarre part. He was actually
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: listed as a good client. Wait really, yeah, he had
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: borrowed from Nobil before paid it back on time. He
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: was in good standing.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: So why murder the guy. If you're a good client,
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: just go ask for another loan.
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: That's what confused the detectives at first. But they bring
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: Sala in any way, and he's a rack right, shaking, sweating.
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: They take a blood sample.
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: And it is a dead on match for the second
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: blood type found in the Biel's salon.
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: Confronted with the DNA, Sala just totally breaks down. He
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: confesses to everything.
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: And his confession allows us to basically reconstruct the entire night.
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: It takes the crime scene from a static set of
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: photos and turns it into a horror movie.
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: Go back to that night. It's five pm, the sun
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: is setting.
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: Sala walks up those same stairs. He isn't there to
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: kill anybody. He's there to borrow money.
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: He needs cash to save his failing business.
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: And he's expecting the standard terrible rate, the fifty percent interest.
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: He's already made peace with being extorted.
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: The Bill lets him in. They sit down, the Bill
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: pours the tea.
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: They're talking business.
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: It's cordial until the Bill completely pulls the rug out
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: from under him.
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: This is the trigger. No Bill looks at Sola, sees
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: how desperate he is, and decides to squeeze him.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: He tells Sla, look, I have another guy willing to
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: pay the pound for a pound rate.
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: He invents a bidding war.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: He says, if you want this money today, you pay
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: one hundred percent interest, you borrow five, you owe me ten.
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: Sla is just stunned. He feels entirely betray.
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: He's already a broken man, and now he's being pushed
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: over the edge by someone he thought he had an
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: understanding with.
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: The negotiation turns into an argument. The argument turns into
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: a screaming match.
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: Sala is begging him, saying it's impossible, it'll ruin him.
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: But the Bill is cold, he won't blood a single.
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: Pound, and the desperation just violently boils over.
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: The physical fight breaks out. Sola grabs a knife, maybe
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: he brought it, maybe he was on the table for fruit.
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: The Bill fights back fiercely, slices Sala's hands open, but
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: Sala is younger.
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: He overpowers the old man. The adrenaline takes over.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: He stabs him seven times.
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: And then just dead silence.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: The Bill is bleeding out on the rug.
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: Sala is standing there, his own hands ripped open, dripping
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: blood everywhere.
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: In reality hits him like a freight train.
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: He's a murderer. Now his life is over. He's going
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: to prison, and the.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: Darkest part, he still doesn't have the money.
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: The only way his fractured mind can justify what he
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: just did is if he walks out of there with
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: the cash to save his family.
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: So the frantic search begins.
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: He tears into the bedroom. He flips the mattress, dumps
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: every single drawer onto the floor.
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: Bleeding all over in Nebille's belongings, searching for the liquid
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: capital the shadow Bank's.
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: Vault, but he doesn't find it, nothing, not a single bill.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: He destroys the room and comes up completely empty.
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: So Sala flees the apartment. He's terrified, he's severely injured,
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: and his pockets are completely empty.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: He destroyed Nabille's life and his own for literally nothing.
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: But the absolute devastating irony of this entire case is
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: what the police found later.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: Right when the forensics team actually took their time searching
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: the apartment, they found the money, the entire fortune. Where
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: was it.
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: It wasn't in the bedroom, It wasn't under the mattress.
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: It was in the kitchen, inside.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: The refrigerator, the one place Sala didn't look.
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: Nobill kept his entire operational fortune stacks, a cash hidden
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: in the fridge, probably sitting right behind the milk wow.
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: While Sala was French destroying the bedroom, literally feet away
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: from him was everything he was looking for.
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: It's just chilling. It forces you to really look at
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: what desperation does to the human brain.
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: It creates a total blind spot, you having.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: To beel right. Yeah, a man so consumed by greed
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: that he's hoarding wealth in a refrigerator, living like a
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: miser while terrorizing his neighbors.
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: And then you have Salah, a man so consumed by
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: debt and panic that he can't even think clearly enough
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: to check the kitchen.
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: The pound for a pound mentality destroyed them both.
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: Sala admitted in his confession that he knew usury was
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: morally and religiously wrong. He knew he was playing a dangerous.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: Game, but he used the ultimate excuse.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: I have no choice.
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: And that's the tragedy. That feeling of having no choice
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: acts like a blinder.
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: It stops you from seeing the consequences of your actions.
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: And it stops you from seeing this solution, even when
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: it is sitting right there in the next room.
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: It's terrifying. Two lives completely erased over stacks of paper,
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: neither of them would ever get to spend.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: It really leaves you with something to chew on. How
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: much of our own lives, our own decisions are driven
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: by that exact same kind of blind panic.
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: When you focus so hard on the fear of the ledger,
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: you miss the reality right in front of you.
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us on this deep dive. Stay curious,
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: and we'll catch you next time.