Final verdict jails killer husband of Sarah Amin for 25 years

The Criminal Court of Mount Lebanon closed the case of wife killer Ali Zein yesterday with a final verdict sentencing the culprit to 25 years of hard labor and requiring him to pay LBP 150 million for the victim’s heirs. Noting, the Mount Lebanon Grand Jury has indicted Zein on January 20, 2018, of the deliberate killing of his wife, Sarah Amin, but the Criminal Court of Mount Lebanon adjourned the trial to February 14 which coincided with an official holiday. The case dates back to May 2015 when the perpetrator killed his wife in their home in Aramoun (https://goo.gl/b4kXdY). In the details of the ruling, Zein was indicted by virtue of the second paragraph of Article 547 of the Penal Code which states that, “anyone who deliberately kills a person is sentenced to 15-20 years of hard labor” which was modified after the enactment of the Protection of Women and Other Family Members from Domestic Violence Law No. 293. Accordingly, the penalty increased to 25 years in the event of the killing of one of the spouses by the other. On the development, the victim’s family attorney, Ashraf Mousawi, dubbed the verdict as a victory for Sarah and a lesson to be learned by whoever intends to harm a woman. The decision is satisfactory, Mousawi said, and is almost equivalent to life imprisonment, given the age of the culprit (60 years). The appeal in this case is very hard to get, he added. For her part, Kafa director, Zoya Ruhana, expressed satisfaction over the Court’s final decision, but repeated the demand to set up special family tribunals to step up the trial of slayers of women. Many similar cases have been in the court for years, while the perpetrators carry on with their lives, Ruhana maintained. (Al Akhbar, An Nahar, July 31, 2019)

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