Police solve 35-year-old cold case murder of foreign national

AMMAN — The Criminal Court prosecutor on Saturday charged a Jordanian man with premeditated murder in connection with the alleged murder of an Egyptian guard in Amman 35 years ago, official sources said.

Police Spokesperson Lt. Col. Amer Sartawi said that one of the cold case units tasked with investigating unsolved murders reopened the 1987 case.

“The victim was found shot to death while he was guarding a construction site in eastern Amman,” Sartawi told The Jordan Times.

At the time, “police questioned the suspect, who worked at a nearby construction site, but they eliminated him as a suspect”, the police official maintained.

“The suspect was summoned by investigators, and denied killing the victim, but confessed to robbing the construction site,” a senior judicial source told The Jordan Times.

According to the senior judicial source, “the cold case unit officers zeroed in on the suspect because he was the last person to see the victim alive”. 

“The cold case officers gathered new evidence and summoned the suspect for questioning,” the senior judicial source said.

The suspect reportedly confessed to committing the crime in front of criminal Court Prosecutor Hussein Khalayleh, the senior judicial source added.

“When faced with the new evidence, the suspect confessed to shooting and killing the victim, who had attempted to stop him from robbing the construction site,” the senior judicial source said.

The suspect was ordered to be detained at a correctional and rehabilitation centre for 15 days pending further investigation, the senior judicial source added.