Death sentence upheld for man convicted of murdering lover’s husband

AMMAN — The Cassation Court has upheld a January Criminal Court decision to sentence a 40-year-old man to death after convicting him of murdering the husband of his lover in Irbid in June 2015.

The court also upheld a two-year prison term against the victim’s 42-year-old wife for hiding the man who committed the crime, and ordered the killer to pay JD37,000 in compensation to the victim’s family members.

Court documents said the two defendants were involved in an extra-marital affair for almost a year before the June 1 incident.

Three weeks before the incident, the court papers said, “the woman received a call from a strange man who informed her that he knew about her affair with the defendant and that he planned to inform her husband if she did not accept to engage in sexual activities with him”.

“The woman rejected the strange man’s advances and hung up the phone so he called her husband and informed him about his wife’s infidelity,” court papers said.

The victim asked the wife about the “affair but she denied any wrongdoing”, according to court papers.

Afterwards, the court maintained, “the main defendant decided to kill the husband to get rid of him so that he could marry” the victim’s wife.

On the day of the murder, the court said, “the defendant lured the victim to a wooded area where he struck him with an axe on his head repeatedly until he was sure he was dead”, court transcripts said.

The victim’s body was discovered the following day and the two defendants were arrested, court documents added.

The Cassation Court ruled that the Criminal Court’s judgement fell within the rule of law, that the proceedings were proper and that the sentence given was satisfactory.