Café owner charged with premeditated murder of his father-in-law

AMMAN — The Criminal Court prosecutor on Thursday charged a cafeteria owner with the premeditated murder of his father-in-law a day earlier in Sahab, official sources said.

Criminal Court Prosecutor Afif Khawaldeh also charged the suspect’s wife with complicity in premeditated murder, a senior judicial source told The Jordan Times.

The 52-year-old victim, an Arab national, was found strangled to death in his home in Sahab, a town located southeast of Amman, according to a statement released by the Public Security Department (PSD).

Coroners at the scene also detected blows on the victim’s head caused by a blunt object, the PSD statement said.

A special team was formed to investigate the murder, and “investigators managed to identify the suspects after questioning family members,” the judicial source said. 

Citing preliminary questioning of the suspect, the source added that the motive behind the murder was the victim’s “indecent behaviour” towards his family members. 

The suspect told investigators that “his father-in-law had a bad history with him, his wife and her sisters,” the source said.

On Wednesday, the suspect claimed that the victim called his wife and “harassed her, which angered him so he decided to murder him,” the source said.

The suspect headed to his father-in-law’s home and “with the help of his wife entered the house and murdered him,” the source added.

The victim was unemployed with two unmarried daughters and a wife who worked as a cleaning lady in several houses, a second source told The Jordan Times.

Khawaldeh issued orders for the suspect to be detained for 15 days at a correctional and rehabilitation centre pending further investigation, according to the source, who noted that his wife, who is six-months pregnant, was released on bail.