LONDON—A witness at a murder trial, giving evidence from behind a screen, has denied a claim made by a defence lawyer that she heard a screaming match between the two co-accused in which one of them shouted: “What have you done? You’ve killed the woman!”
Kusai Al-Jundi, 24, and Mohamed El-Abboud, 28, deny murdering Louise Kam, 71, who was last seen alive on a CCTV camera entering a house in Barnet, north London, on July 26, 2021.
The prosecution claim she was strangled with electric flex at the house and later her body was dumped in a wheelie bin on the drive of Al-Jundi’s parents’ home in Harrow.
But on Wednesday, El-Abboud’s barrister, Graham Trembath, KC, gave a very different account of what he claimed had happened on the afternoon of Monday, July 26, 2021.
Trembath claimed El-Abboud, who was staying at the house in Barnet, had been “unwell” all weekend and had slept in a bedroom upstairs from the Sunday night right through until after Al-Jundi and Amariucai left the house in a Toyota RAV-4 at 3:19 p.m.
He said Al-Jundi phoned El-Abboud as they drove, waking him up.
Trembath said it was a “highly charged phone call,” which was both in English and Arabic and, he claimed, it was on speakerphone in the car.
Trembath said: “Mohamed was screaming, shouting, agitated, and uncontrollably emotional. He was screaming at Kusai: ‘What have you done? You’ve killed the woman.’”
He said Al-Jundi told El-Abboud, in English: “Shut the [expletive]. The neighbours might hear you.”
Trembath said El-Abboud said, “What have you done?” and he claimed Amariucai said to him, “Please calm down.”
‘Nobody Will Believe You’
Trembath went on: “Kusai then told Mohamed: ‘Don’t make such a mistake. Nobody would believe you,’ and then Kusai said: ‘Listen to me. Leave it to me. I will clean it and sort out the mess. Don’t worry. Just shut your mouth.’”He said Mohamed then shouted: “You’ve ruined my life. What am I supposed to do?”
Trembath said Kusai then told him aggressively: “You better shut up. You have no house to live in. No family. You don’t speak good English. But I have it all. I have power over you. I control everything with money.'”
El-Abboud’s lawyer then asked Amariucai if she remembered hearing that conversation and she replied: “I didn’t hear any shouting or screaming. It was all in Arabic and I had nothing to say about it. But there was no shouting.”
Kam owned a house in Barnet, north London, and a shop with three flats above it, in Willesden, northwest London.
The prosecution say Al-Jundi tricked her into believing he had a rich friend, Anna Reich, who was willing to pay £5 million for the Barnet house, which was worth around £1 million, and well over the market price for the other property.
Opening the case last month prosecutor Oliver Glasgow, KC, told the jury Kam was “doubtless tempted” as she stood to make a substantial profit.
The prosecution claim Al-Jundi met with a solicitor in June 2021 and “claimed that both properties were owned by Louise Kam who wanted to move to China and put both of them into his name.”
On Tuesday, Amariucai had said she first met Al-Jundi in May 2021 when she came to London to see El-Abboud.
She denied they were “romantically involved” but said he was attracted to her and bombarded her with compliments, saying he wanted her to marry him and have his children.
Amariucai admitted calling him “my king” but on Wednesday she denied an accusation by Trembath that she had been “leading him on” because she thought he was wealthy.
She stayed at the house in Barnet and she told the court she saw a “Chinese lady” visit on the afternoon of July 26, 2021, and saw her in the company of El-Abboud and Al-Jundi.
On Wednesday a juror asked if Amariucai had seen Kam in the house before she left and she said she saw her sitting on the sofa in the living room.
On Tuesday, Amariucai said El-Abboud gave her a lift back to Coventry later that evening and she said, “He said he could not believe that he had killed that lady.”
Glasgow asked her, “Which lady?”
“The Chinese lady,” she replied, through a Romanian interpreter.
The trial is set to last until January.
