A Somali migrant is due to stand trial in Sweden next week for the murder of his pregnant girlfriend he is suspected of strangling to death to hide from his family the fact he was in a relationship with a non-Muslim, non-Somali woman.
Mohamedamin Abdirisek Ibrahim, 21, was arrested in Örebro on May 2 last year after his girlfriend, 20-year-old Saga, was found dead in her apartment. She had died from asphyxiation and had been seven months pregnant with Ibrahim’s child.
“I believe the murder took place in the context of an honor killing because the man wanted to preserve or restore his honor and that of his family by killing the woman who was carrying his child,” said public prosecutor Elisabeth Anderson in a statement to journalists shortly after the arrest.
The suspect has been in pre-trial detention for 11 months while police officers conducted their investigations into the murder.
An examination of text messages on Ibrahim’s phone revealed the disgust his Somali mother, also living in Sweden, had toward the notion her son was in a relationship with a White woman.
“Take the bus or stay with your loved one. Don’t come home. I am no longer your mother. I am Muslim and Somali,” one message from his mother read after her car often used by Ibrahim was spotted outside Saga’s address.
“I am also Muslim and Somali, and I do not go home to a white person,” Ibrahim replied, denying the relationship with Saga, a Swedish woman of Thai origin.
In another row over the relationship, the suspect vowed to return to Somalia with his mother to make amends for upsetting her. “Whatever you decide, I follow, mom,” he wrote.
Following the indictment, Anderson said it was the prosecution’s case that the murder was an honor killing to save Ibrahim the ignominy of revealing the truth about Saga’s pregnancy to his family.
“He has tried to keep the relationship a secret. The suspect’s family did not accept that he was with a White girl and believed he had been exposed to strong emotional influence,” the prosecutor told Swedish media.
Further communications found between the suspect and his victim on the night before the murder revealed how Ibrahim had agreed to tell his family about the relationship.
“Feels like I can almost feel my heartbeat all the way down to my stomach walla,” he sent to Saga.
“Just take it easy, they’ll be fine babe,” she replied.
However, over the course of the evening, it is the prosecution’s case that the suspect changed his mind and visited his girlfriend’s apartment before strangling her to death.
In a composed message that was never sent, Ibrahim wrote, “Forgive me, I really feel sick from all this, sorry, but I can’t handle this, I can be there and help if something is needed, but I can’t tell my family.”
The suspect has denied the murder, and his mother told police officers she would have no issue with the ethnicity of her son’s girlfriend or future child.
Elisabeth Fritz, a lawyer for the relatives of the deceased, vowed to “work hard for a conviction, a life sentence, and compensation” for the “cruel murder.”
The trial begins on April 10.
