MURDER suspect Magda Eleftheriou broke into tears as she was told by a Nicosia Court yesterday that she would not be allowed to be with her children until her trial in December.
The 32-year-old bank employee, her 28-year-old Pakistani lover, Zeesharr Asgmas Muhamad and his Chinese roommate, 22-year-old Yu Hong Bo, yesterday appeared in court charged with the murder of Magda’s husband Pavlos Christodoulou on the night of Saturday, July 17.
Muhamad and Bo are said to have admitted in statements to having bludgeoned Christodoulou to death and burning his body in the boot of his BMW. They named Magda as the person who allegedly masterminded the murder.
She is said to have admitted calling her husband from a mobile phone asking him to go to the place where Muhamad and Bo were waiting, and that she knew that Muhamad was going to hit Christodoulou.
In a court packed with around 50 of Christodoulou’s relatives dressed in black, the three suspects were told by Judge Elena Ephraim that they would be sent directly to trial on December 16 on charges of conspiracy to commit murder, premeditated murder, and arson.
The maximum sentence on the first two charges is life imprisonment, with a 14-year maximum for arson.
Public Prosecutor Lefkos Kyriakides yesterday asked the court for the suspects to be detained until the day of their trial.
He said their detention would prevent them escaping trial and influencing witnesses who come from their close personal, professional and family environment.
Kyriakides said the suspects should also be detained due to the seriousness of the charges they are facing.
Muhamad and Bo did not object to their remand until December, but Magda’s lawyer Costis Efstathiou asked the court to make an exception on his client’s case due to the fact that she is the mother of two under-age children.
But Ephraim said that although the court was troubled by her case, her personal drama and that of her children should not stand in the way of the public interests and pervert the course of justice.
“Therefore the police request for her remand is completely justified and the suspect will be remanded until her trial in December,” she said.
Christodoulou’s family hurled abuse at the suspects as they were rushed out of court and into a police van and cruiser.
As a sobbing Magda appeared at the court entrance, the relatives shouted “Satan”, and “murderer”, with police trying to hold them back.
