The United Arab Emirates (UAE) yesterday executed an Emirati woman convicted of the murder of a US schoolteacher in an Abu Dhabi shopping mall, state media reported.
Alaa Bader al-Hashemi, 30, was executed at dawn after Emirati President Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan approved the death sentence issued last month, the official WAM news agency said.
It cited prosecutors at the state security court, but did not say how the execution was carried out.
Al-Hashemi had been sentenced to death after being found guilty of stabbing to death Ibolya Ryan, 47, a mother of three, in a toilet of the shopping complex on Dec. 1 last year.
She was also convicted of placing a handmade pipe bomb outside an Egyptian-American doctor’s home in the UAE capital on the same day, although the device failed to explode.
ONLINE ACTIVITY
Al-Hashemi was found to have used an Internet account to spread information that was likely to “jeopardize” the United Arab Emirates, the verdict said.
She also was found guilty of having sent funds to al-Qaeda in Yemen, knowing that this money would be used for “terrorist acts.”
The ruling was made by the Emirati Federal Supreme Court in Abu Dhabi and cannot be appealed, but requires the formal approval of the head of state in the UAE, where executions are rare.
Al-Hashemi had been dubbed the “Reem Island Ghost” after the location of the mall where the stabbing of Ryan took place.
Tracked down using closed-circuit TV footage of her going into and out of the restroom where the murder occurred and near the doctor’s building, al-Hashemi was arrested 48 hours later.
‘UNREAL VISIONS’
During her trial, al-Hashemi had asked the court to provide her with psychological help, saying that she had “unreal visions” and would see “ghost-like people” due to a chronic mental illness.
The court ordered psychiatric tests that it said showed she was aware of her actions.
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