00:00:03
[theme music] NARRATOR: A fatal fall
from a second floor window of a Detroit mansion.
00:00:14
- I start screaming and I
run to my brother's room. NARRATOR: A devoted
mom's life cut short.
00:00:25
- Bassel arrives, sees
his estranged wife dead, and he drops in shock. NARRATOR: Was it simply
just tragic misfortune?
00:00:37
- The physical
examination did find fractures consistent
with a fall of this kind.
00:00:43
NARRATOR: Or murder? [theme music] [melancholy music] JIM KIERTZNER: Nada Huranieh
have moved here to Michigan
00:01:17
from Syria in the Middle East. Her husband, Bassel Altantawi,
was a medical doctor
00:01:23
and set up a practice
here in Metro Detroit. BOB ZIVIAN: Nada and Bassel
had come to the United States
00:01:30
from Syria. They were raising
their children in Farmington Hills, which is
a very nice suburb of Detroit.
00:01:36
JIM KIERTZNER: They
were devout Muslims. They were members
of a local mosque, and they had three
children-- their son Muhammad
00:01:44
and two daughters,
including Aya. - My name is Aya Altantawi. My mom was a very,
very kind person.
00:01:53
She put everybody before
her and she loved us. She loved her kids. She and I, we had a pretty
good relationship.
00:02:01
We bonded over makeup. She was very, very good at it. She was very passionate
about the gym,
00:02:08
about working out, just
feeling like the best version of herself. NARRATOR: Such was
not as love of fitness
00:02:15
that she eventually turned
her passion into a career, working as a personal
trainer at her local gym
00:02:21
in Farmington Hills. AYA ALTANTAWI: She was
becoming more independent. She was actually living her
life for the first time.
00:02:30
She and I would go to the gym,
I would do my session, she would be working
out, or she would
00:02:34
be teaching her own clients. And then we'd work out
for a little bit at the end and then we'd go home.
00:02:40
NARRATOR: Nada
embraced the sense of freedom and independence
that her new career gave her.
00:02:46
But her husband, Bassel,
wasn't so supportive. AYA ALTANTAWI: He
didn't like it.
00:02:51
He didn't think it
was necessary for her to be independent. He thought that his
role for the family
00:02:58
was to be the provider,
so there was no need for her to be independent, because we
all were reliant on him
00:03:04
and he was there to provide
everything we needed, so he didn't like that. He wanted, I think, us
to be just lost without him.
00:03:12
My dad was very old-school in
his thinking, to put it nicely. So my mom wanting to get
a job, to work at the gym,
00:03:20
to live her life, to him was
she's becoming Americanized. And he didn't want that.
00:03:27
BOB ZIVIAN: There became
turmoil in their marriage based on Nada's desire
to become more Westernized,
00:03:34
and Bassel's desire
to have a traditional wife within their religious
practices.
00:03:40
He did say that
once she removed the hijab, that she wasn't
really a person anymore.
00:03:47
He didn't consider
her to be a person, and that was the part
that really disturbed me.
00:03:52
AYA ALTANTAWI: They
would have arguments, but at first it was
always "don't talk
00:03:57
about it around the kids,
wait until the kids are gone." But eventually that
pretense dropped
00:04:01
and it was just all out
in the open, constant yelling and screaming
for my dad towards my mom.
00:04:07
He was becoming violent,
uncontrollable in his fits of anger, and he wanted
to put us in a little box
00:04:15
and hide us away
and lock the key. BOB ZIVIAN: He was a man who
was used to being in control,
00:04:24
and that included
in his tradition being in control of his wife. And he was losing
that control, and
00:04:32
it was very upsetting to him. NARRATOR: In early
2016, Bassel and Nada's volatile relationship
escalated to whole new levels.
00:04:42
- Around Valentine's Day, I
remember I woke up to hearing them screaming and arguing.
00:04:47
And I opened my door
and I went to the railing to look down and see
what was going on.
00:04:54
And my dad was
holding my mom's phone and he was like walking
around the house trying
00:04:59
to get away from her and, like,
he wouldn't give her her phone back. And he went
to their bedroom and he
00:05:05
was standing behind the door. And my mom put her hand in the
door to try to pry it open,
00:05:11
and my dad slammed
it shut on her hand. Eventually, I called the police
and they arrested him.
00:05:19
They took him
to police station. They put a tether
on him, an ankle monitor. So he wasn't allowed
to come back to the house
00:05:25
under any circumstance. JIM KIERTZNER: Bassel
would eventually be charged with domestic violence.
00:05:31
He would plead no contest,
but it would be the beginning of the end of their marriage.
00:05:38
NARRATOR: Bassel was also
issued with a protective order, banning him from
the family home.
00:05:44
Shortly after his
domestic violence charge, Nada started
divorce proceedings while juggling her career
alongside parenting
00:05:51
three young children
as a single mom. BOB ZIVIAN: This divorce
between Bassel and Nada
00:05:57
was definitely what I would
call a high conflict divorce. There was a lot of contention.
00:06:04
I was concerned about
Nada's general safety, but there was a court order
in place that protected her.
00:06:12
- A lot of times
nobody knew what she was going through
because she didn't want to talk about her issues.
00:06:16
She wanted to talk about
what was bothering the people that she loved, so that
she can try to help them.
00:06:21
Most of the time, we didn't
know what the details of what she was going through.
00:06:28
NARRATOR: Approximately 18
months after the incident between Bassel and Nada, on the
morning of Monday, August 21,
00:06:36
2017, 14-year-old
Aya was preparing for her usual school day. - It was the second week of my
sophomore year of high school.
00:06:46
I was excited. But that day, I woke up late. Normally my mom would
already be awake.
00:06:53
She would have had her
coffee or whatever. I think I remember hearing
my brother's shower on,
00:07:00
but nobody else was
awake in the house. So I thought, "OK, let me
get ready and then I'll see
00:07:06
where everybody else is at." I finished getting ready and I
sat on my bed and I was like,
00:07:10
"OK, this is really strange." It's like 6:15-ish. Nobody else seems to be awake.
00:07:15
We're going to be late. So I called my mom
but didn't get a response. So I was like, "OK,
I'm going to go find
00:07:20
her and see what's going on." I went to the guest bedroom. That was where she would do
her makeup every morning.
00:07:29
The window was open and I
thought, "maybe, just in case, let me go look out there."
00:07:35
AMBER HAQUE:
The guest bedroom was towards the back of the house. It was two floors up and looked
out over a concrete patio,
00:07:41
which was 22 feet down. JIM KIERTZNER: Inside
that guest bedroom, a stepladder, a bottle of
cleaning solution on top of it.
00:07:49
Next to it, a bucket of water. All right next
to that open window. When Aya looked out
the window, two floors below,
00:07:57
she saw the lifeless
body of her mother, Nada, on the patio, face up, still
dressed in her pajamas.
00:08:06
- I start screaming and I
run to my brother's room. I open his door and I
said, "our mom's outside.
00:08:15
Our mom's outside." He was like, "what? What are you talking about?" I think he was falling
behind me at this point,
00:08:21
and I was running out the
garage to go around the house, and I just kept-- I was telling him,
"come on, we have to go.
00:08:27
Our mom's outside." JIM KIERTZNER: Despite
how distressing this was, Aya just
seen her mother.
00:08:35
She was able to get her brother
to come down to the patio where her mother was,
and she called 911.
00:08:41
[phone rings] NARRATOR: Oakland County Police
officers raced to Nada's home, while a 911 operator stayed
on the line with Aya.
00:09:22
- Aya gave her brother Muhammad
the phone at this point. He then started following
the dispatcher's instructions
00:09:27
to give CPR to his mom. At around 6:40 AM, as Muhammad
was performing CPR on his mom,
00:09:56
the police arrived. NARRATOR: Aya
directed the officers as they arrived, while
the 911 operators probed
00:10:03
Muhammad on what had happened. - Officer Nathan Jordan
was the first one to arrive on the scene.
00:10:33
He checked Nada. She was still
warm to the touch, but she would later be
declared dead on the scene.
00:10:45
NARRATOR: After mother of three
Nada Huranieh fatally fell from a second floor window, her
14-year-old daughter Aya,
00:10:54
who had found her
mother's body, was unaware that she had been
pronounced dead at the scene.
00:11:01
AYA ALTANTAWI: When they took
her, I was under the impression that she was going to the
hospital to be worked on.
00:11:05
I thought, "OK, she's
going to be in the ICU, obviously critical
condition," but not death.
00:11:11
I thought, "we
probably wouldn't get any update
for a couple of hours, but she was still alive."
00:11:16
But no, she was declared
dead on the scene. But I didn't know that
until hours later.
00:11:22
AMBER HAQUE: Aya's younger
sister had been asleep during the whole incident,
so the only people
00:11:27
who were there at the time were
Aya and her brother Muhammad. So they were both interviewed
by police at the scene.
00:11:42
In the guest bedroom, there
were streaks on the window as well as an iPhone left
on top of the dresser.
00:11:48
There was no immediate signs
of a struggle or forced entry that the police could see,
so they assumed that this
00:11:55
had been a tragic accident. Whilst Nada had been cleaning
the window, she'd fallen.
00:12:02
AYA ALTANTAWI: They were
asking us a lot of questions. They were asking what
our mom's normal routine
00:12:06
was, if it was normal
for her to clean the windows. I said, "no,
that's not normal."
00:12:11
Any cleaning that
she would do would be like washing leftover
dishes from the night
00:12:15
before, but not cleaning
the outside of a window. She would normally hire
a company to come do that.
00:12:21
And then they were also
asking about my mom's history, if she ever attempted
to harm herself.
00:12:26
And I adamantly,
immediately said no. And my brother was
like, "Aya, you didn't know this but, yeah, she
tried to kill herself once."
00:12:34
And I turned to him
and I was like, "what are you talking about? No, she didn't."
00:12:38
And he's like, "Aya,
you didn't know this. But yeah, she tried
taking a bunch of pills."
00:12:42
I just didn't
think it was true. I thought there would have been
no way I didn't know about it
00:12:47
if our mother overdosed. It didn't make sense. No matter which way
I tried to spin it,
00:12:53
there was no
plausible explanation. NARRATOR: As Aya
and her siblings were all under 18 and alone,
emergency services
00:13:03
called their estranged
father Bassel to come and look after the children. - Bassel arrives and he
sees his estranged
00:13:11
wife dead on the patio, and he
drops to his knees in shock. At this point, Aya still didn't
know that her mother was dead.
00:13:23
NARRATOR: It was
the first time Bassel had returned to the family home
since the protective order.
00:13:28
His behavior and comments
to his daughter Aya raised suspicions
among investigators.
00:13:34
AYA ALTANTAWI:
That day I had gym, so I was wearing leggings
and a shirt and the back of it
00:13:39
had an open back cutout. My dad comes into the house,
and he's like, "Aya, what are you wearing?
00:13:46
You're going to go to hell if
you keep dressing like that." And I'm just thinking,
"what is wrong with you?
00:13:49
This is the first time you're
seeing me in over a year and a half, and the first thing
you're saying to me is,
00:13:55
Aya, you're going
to go to hell if you keep dressing like that?" HONOR DORO TOWNSHEND: Aya's
father, immediately commenting
00:14:00
on her state of dress after Aya
has just witnessed this very traumatic experience, and is
a child who actually needs
00:14:07
consoling, is very telling
about his sort of attitude, approach to family, and I
believe attitude towards women
00:14:15
as well. NARRATOR: Still unaware that
her mom Nada's fall was fatal, Aya was desperate to find
out her condition.
00:14:24
- My dad took us to a bunch
of different places that day. I think we were
coming back from one
00:14:28
of his friends' houses. We were in the car,
my dad driving, and he was on the phone with
his mom talking in Arabic.
00:14:36
And we were pulling up
into our driveway and he said, "oh, Nada's dead." Everybody gets out of the car
and I say to my dad,
00:14:45
"when were you
planning on telling me that our mother was dead?" And he turns to me
and his face drops.
00:14:50
He starts crying. He turns to me and he-- he's like, "Aya, we
have to stick together.
00:14:54
We only have each other now. We have to be there
for each other." And he's hugging me and I just
have my arms down at my sides.
00:15:01
I'm not hugging him back. I didn't trust him. I didn't feel safe with him. I didn't-- I didn't
want to be around him.
00:15:10
I think it just reinforced
that any hope I had for him changing, becoming empathetic,
becoming a father was gone.
00:15:25
HONOR DORO TOWNSHEND: Security
and stability are key pillars of any child's upbringing.
00:15:30
Just needs, basic,
fundamental needs. And for Aya, all
of that has been ripped away in a matter of hours.
00:15:37
Her mom has passed. She already has a very
complicated relationship with her abusive father.
00:15:42
And so that's really got to put
her in such a difficult and emotional position, which
is a huge amount to try
00:15:49
and comprehend
at just 14 years old. NARRATOR: On August 22, the
morning after Nada had died,
00:15:57
the medical examiner carried
out an initial autopsy on her body. She had suffered
scrapes and fractures
00:16:04
consistent with
a fall from height, but there was no blood
found under her body.
00:16:10
She also had a scrape
on her head, which had not bled as profusely as would
have been expected,
00:16:16
and no bleeding on the brain,
meaning her heart had stopped pumping before
she went out the window.
00:16:25
JIM KIERTZNER: That means
she couldn't have jumped. She couldn't have
accidentally fallen.
00:16:29
She died before she
fell on the patio below. They went back to run further
tests, and at the same time,
00:16:39
police returned to the house
with a search warrant. There were six security
cameras around the outside
00:16:45
of the house, and they
confiscated the equipment for further review. AMBER HAQUE: Unfortunately,
none of the cameras
00:16:52
looked directly
at the guest bedroom, but there was a bit
of footage found that blew
00:16:58
the investigation open. NARRATOR: Detectives came
across surveillance of the spot
00:17:05
where Nada's body was found. And on footage recorded at 5:54
AM, they saw Nada's body
00:17:12
falling to the ground. But when they
looked at it again, they spotted something
chilling in the shadow
00:17:19
of the second floor bedroom
from where Nada fell. On the left
of the frame, a light
00:17:26
appears to come on,
followed by a curtain opening in the guest bedroom. A person with short hair could
be seen opening a window,
00:17:35
before something heavy
was dragged over to it and thrown out of the window
just before Nada's body
00:17:42
fell to the patio below. [tense music] - This is not someone
who's accidentally fallen to their death,
they're on their own.
00:17:51
Someone else is there
and is involved. - This fundamentally
changed the investigation.
00:17:58
This was now a homicide,
not an accident. They could clearly see
somebody had pushed
00:18:04
Nada's body out of the window. But whose shadow was it? - The first person
who came to mind
00:18:11
for many was Nada's estranged
husband, Dr. Bassel Altantawi. NARRATOR: Bassel's history
of domestic violence
00:18:19
after slamming a door
on Nada's hand, stood out as a red
flag for detectives. - The police immediately
look at Bassel as a suspect
00:18:29
and you can understand why. In the US, it's estimated
that up to nearly 50% of all female
victims of homicide
00:18:37
have been murdered by intimate
partners, past or current. And so combining that
with Bassel's history
00:18:43
of domestic violence
and abuse can really highlight why he was a probable
contender for police suspicion
00:18:50
and why they wanted
to ask him some very significant questions. NARRATOR: Investigators
were also aware
00:18:56
that during divorce proceedings
between Bassel and Nada, he had become the subject of
another criminal investigation.
00:19:04
- Bassel had found himself
in some serious legal trouble after there had been an
investigation into his clinic.
00:19:11
BOB ZIVIAN: Bassel was
convicted of health fraud in the state of Michigan. That was handled by the
attorney general of the state
00:19:18
of Michigan at the time. - He had to pay
a heavy fine, and he lost his medical license.
00:19:24
NARRATOR:
But investigators were shocked to discover that
their prime suspect, Bassel, had an airtight alibi.
00:19:32
As part of his
protective order, Bassel wore a GPS tracking
ankle monitor that fed his
00:19:38
location to authorities 24/7. JIM KIERTZNER: Turns out he was
20 miles away when Nada died.
00:19:45
Bassel Altantawi
was not the killer. [tense music] NARRATOR: After detectives
spotted a shadowy figure
00:19:56
on a surveillance camera
pushing the body of 35-year-old mother of three Nada Huranieh
from a second floor window,
00:20:03
investigators began to narrow
down their hunt for her killer. - They now knew that her
abusive, estranged husband
00:20:12
had a rock solid alibi. So the investigators now
needed to know the whereabouts of the children
at the time of the murder
00:20:20
and try to work
out if somebody had broken in to kill their mom. The day after Nada was killed,
police wanted to interview
00:20:28
both Aya and Muhammad. And their dad,
Bassel, suggested that the best place to do
that would be the family home.
00:20:35
Aya went to school. And when Bassel
went to pick her up, Muhammad was being
interviewed by police.
00:20:41
NARRATOR: Sat
at the family's dining table, detectives quizzed 16-year-old
Muhammad about his mom.
00:21:10
- Muhammad's attitude towards
his parents' divorce comes up, and he acknowledges that there
was some difficult feelings
00:21:15
there, which is understandable
and happens, I'm going to say, in pretty much every
case of divorce
00:21:20
where children might find
that situation difficult. So nothing raises initial
significant alarm bells.
00:21:38
Muhammad still seems to have
a pretty strong relationship with his father, and certainly
stronger than that his sisters
00:21:44
have with him. And perhaps that just
expresses that this is a very young person who
maybe doesn't understand
00:21:51
the violence that's occurred
between his mother and father, because clearly
that's disrupted
00:21:57
the relationship between
his father and his sisters, but doesn't seem
to have between them.
00:22:26
AMBER HAQUE: Police knew that
it was only the children who'd been in the house that day.
00:22:31
So they began
to question Muhammad about who this figure that
they'd seen on the CCTV
00:22:36
could be. NARRATOR: Although Muhammad
claimed his sister was awake before him, investigators
already knew it couldn't have
00:23:14
been her in the guest bedroom. - The investigators
had a crucial detail from this footage that
the person had short hair.
00:23:23
So that ruled out Aya. NARRATOR: Although
Muhammad denied being in the guest bedroom
with his mother that morning,
00:23:39
police continued to press
him about his whereabouts. HONOR DORO TOWNSHEND:
Muhammad's story
00:24:07
has now shifted significantly. Now, this throws into question
all of the account
00:24:13
that he's made prior,
because it's impossible now to know which elements
have been fabricated,
00:24:18
which elements are
based in truth. - Under pressure, Muhammad's
story really starts
00:24:48
to fluctuate quite a bit. He admits that he was
in the room with his mom. He was helping her out
while she was cleaning,
00:24:55
holding the ladder for her. But then when she
fell, in shock, he took himself
off to the shower.
00:25:19
- When you're looking
at a police interview, there is a very key
difference between someone
00:25:24
adding in additional
pieces of information and changing information. And what we're
starting to see here
00:25:31
is that Muhammad is starting
to err on changing information, and that can be a real red
flag for potential deceit.
00:25:39
NARRATOR: At this point,
Bassel arrived home and stopped the interview. Following Muhammad's
shock confession
00:26:02
that he was in the room
at the time of his mom's death, police interviewed
the children separately
00:26:07
to avoid them communicating
or corroborating on one version of events. Aya used her police
interview as an opportunity
00:26:17
to explain that she didn't
want to live under the care of her abusive father. AYA ALTANTAWI: When we
got to the police station
00:26:24
and we were being
questioned, that was when I was able to make
that very clear that
00:26:30
regardless of what
happens, I am not going back home with him. And yeah, I chose
to go into foster care.
00:26:39
Me and my sister were going
to go live with a family relative who I knew, had known
for the majority of my life,
00:26:45
and I trusted and I
felt safer with them. So it was a no-brainer for me. NARRATOR: On August
24, 2017, three days
00:26:55
after Nada's fatal push, Aya
received an unexpected message on her cell phone. AYA ALTANTAWI: I got a text
from somebody that I had gone
00:27:04
to middle school with,
and he had texted me saying, "Aya, I am so sorry
for your loss,
00:27:09
but do you think he did it?" And I was like, "do I
think who did what?" He said, "I'm so sorry,
you didn't hear?
00:27:15
They're charging your brother?" I found out from
a middle school classmate that my brother
was being charged
00:27:22
with the death of my mother. I was in shock. It was more like
an out-of-body experience
00:27:29
where, OK, yeah, I
went through this, and I'm telling
you all about it, but I'm not feeling
the emotions
00:27:34
that are connected with it. I'm just-- I don't know, I-- JIM KIERTZNER: On the day
this case happened,
00:27:44
I went out to the family home,
tried to talk to neighbors, but they didn't know
this family very well.
00:27:49
The family kept to themselves. But after a few days
of it being in the news, Nada's friends started
calling police.
00:27:57
Nada would tell them
that Muhammad, her son, blamed her for the trouble
in the family
00:28:02
and that she would always
have her daughters, but she was dead to her son. NARRATOR: Processing
the news that her brother had
00:28:11
been arrested and charged for
the murder of his own mother, Aya reflected
on Muhammad's behavior
00:28:18
in the lead up to Nada's death. - He was becoming a lot more
assertive, a lot more violent.
00:28:25
I think he genuinely thought
that now that our dad's out of the house, he has
to step up and be the man
00:28:33
and put us in our place. My brother was in contact
with my dad a lot. Just became a little like
spy essentially for my dad
00:28:46
because this was during
their divorce case. BOB ZIVIAN: I had
an encounter with Muhammad
00:28:54
that led me to believe that
Muhammad had taken his father's side in the divorce.
00:29:02
It's actually a blizzard
here in Michigan, and I parked my car
close to the house.
00:29:09
I met with Nada. I had not seen Muhammad. And then when I went to leave,
when I went to get into my car,
00:29:18
Muhammad was actually
standing right behind my car, and he seemed to be
recording my license plate.
00:29:25
The only thing I
could think of that made sense under
the circumstances that he was going to be
reporting to his father.
00:29:32
AYA ALTANTAWI: So he was
trying to find anything he could to give to my dad
to use as leverage is
00:29:37
my guess in the divorce case. So it made sense
that he did it. So I still thought, "OK, maybe
somehow he accidentally did it
00:29:46
or he didn't mean to do
it," or I don't know, I guess I didn't fully believe
that it was 100% intentional.
00:29:51
- Aya is a young
and vulnerable girl in this situation, whose
entire life has been torn
00:29:57
apart in a matter of moments. And so, of course,
she's clinging on to the hope of her
brother's innocence
00:30:03
because she's already lost
her mother and her father, and now this is her potentially
losing her brother, too.
00:30:11
NARRATOR: While
Muhammad awaited trial for the murder
of his own mother, his father, Bassel,
hired a veteran defense
00:30:18
attorney named Michael Ciano. AMBER HAQUE: One
of the first things that Michael did was highlight
that the day after Nada died,
00:30:26
Muhammad was interviewed
by three police officers without his dad
or an attorney present.
00:30:33
He could have been
coerced by the officers. He hadn't been read
his rights, and that whatever he said
in that interview
00:30:39
couldn't then be admissible
in the court case. NARRATOR: The court
ruled in their favor,
00:30:44
meaning prosecutors were unable
to call in Muhammad's kitchen table interview for the trial.
00:30:52
But in November 2017, during
a preliminary court hearing, new details of Nada's
autopsy report
00:31:00
were revealed to the public
for the first time. The key finding,
which investigators
00:31:05
were already aware of, was that
Nada had died by asphyxiation. She had been
smothered to death.
00:31:16
Armed with evidence that
Nada had been murdered, investigators continued
to build their case
00:31:22
and discovered that
Muhammad resented his mother for the failure of his
parents' marriage,
00:31:27
and had taken his father's
side during the divorce. AYA ALTANTAWI: In the very
beginning of the divorce case,
00:31:35
our mother would
ask him where he was going, when he was going
to meet up with our dad,
00:31:38
and he wouldn't tell her. But then he would ask
us where we were going and expect answers.
00:31:42
Or when she would try
to take his phone because he was texting her dad
and he wasn't supposed to,
00:31:47
he would not let
her, and it would turn into its own
physical altercation, and he would then take
her phone instead.
00:31:53
It was just very bizarre. AMBER HAQUE: Despite her
brother's arrest and his murder
00:32:00
charge, Aya was still
holding on to that hope that he might be innocent. - I lost my dad long
before my mom died.
00:32:08
I lost my mom. I didn't want to lose
my brother, too. I think that's part
of the reason why I was not
00:32:14
fully accepting that it
was 100% intentionally premeditated murder. There has to be some
other explanation.
00:32:21
Maybe he did do it, but how
do you kill your mother? How do you kill anyone,
much less your mother?
00:32:30
NARRATOR: After extended
legal wranglings over the use
of a police interview, Muhammad Altantawi spent
years awaiting trial
00:32:38
for the murder of his
mother, Nada Huranieh, who had been suffocated
before being pushed
00:32:44
out of a second floor window. - In March 2022, nearly five
years after Nada's death,
00:32:51
Muhammad Altantawi's
murder trial began. - Muhammad Altantawi
would go on trial,
00:32:57
charged as an adult
with first-degree premeditated murder. BOB ZIVIAN: I was
not at the trial.
00:33:05
I had, at that
point, moved jobs and moved back
to the prosecutor's office, who was prosecuting Muhammad.
00:33:15
So I had nothing to do with
the prosecution of the case, by order of the prosecutor.
00:33:22
NARRATOR: Although Muhammad
Altantawi was only 16 years old when he killed his mom,
he was tried as an adult
00:33:29
because Michigan State law
allows prosecutors to charge juveniles as adults in cases
of serious offenses,
00:33:36
such as murder. JIM KIERTZNER: A case like
this is extremely rare, and there's a name for it:
matricide, maternal homicide,
00:33:44
where a child kills
his or her own mother. The death of a mother
at the hands of a child?
00:33:50
Almost unheard of. In opening statements
at the trial, prosecutors focused
on the motive and
00:33:58
also the family
dynamics, that Muhammad had a hatred for his
mother, her growing
00:34:03
need for more independence,
her new Americanized lifestyle. And the timing,
Nada was set to give
00:34:09
a deposition against Muhammad's
father in the divorce. He wanted to stop that. BOB ZIVIAN: Nada came
to my office on a Friday
00:34:20
before she passed away to
prepare for a deposition that was to be held
the next week, where
00:34:26
Bassel's attorney
would question Nada, and I, in turn, would
question Bassel. And I got
the impression that she
00:34:35
did not think that
the deposition was ever going to take place. Why that is? I don't know.
00:34:42
I was very concerned
about it, and I assumed that
Nada knew something that I didn't know
that was going
00:34:50
to happen between the meeting
in my office on Friday and the deposition, which was
scheduled for the next week.
00:34:58
As it turned out, we'll never
know because Nada passed away a couple days later.
00:35:05
- This case wasn't just
about the physical facts of who was where and when. It was about a family
split down the middle,
00:35:13
and whether hatred between
a father, wife, and a son could really cause
someone to kill.
00:35:21
NARRATOR: The big
question for prosecutors was whether they would
be able to convince
00:35:25
a jury that a son was capable
of killing his own mother. Part of the prosecution's case
focused on inconsistencies
00:35:34
at the crime scene. - The prosecutor
explained to the jury that this was not
an accident, that Nada
00:35:40
had been suffocated
before she fell, and that the scene
had been staged. The ladder next to the window
with a cleaning bottle
00:35:48
of solution on top of it. One detective testified,
that's not a solution that's used to clean windows.
00:35:55
And next to Nada's
body on the patio below was a towel,
a cloth that had some solution in it
that may have also
00:36:03
been used to suffocate Nada. NARRATOR: Then it was time for
the prosecution's key evidence:
00:36:12
the surveillance video footage. - Prosecution showed the jury,
the video evidence, the shadows
00:36:18
from the surveillance cameras. A person with short hair
dragging something over to the window, then
hoisting it out the window
00:36:27
just moments before Nada's
body would hit the ground. They also pointed
out that inside
00:36:34
the house were only
the three children and only one had short hair-- Muhammad. NARRATOR: At one
point in the video,
00:36:43
Muhammad could be seen
giving his mother CPR. But according
to the prosecution, only half-heartedly.
00:36:51
Furthermore, while on the phone
to emergency services, he was not giving her
chest compressions at all
00:36:58
and was simply counting. MUHAMMAD ALTANTAWI: 1, 2, 3, 4. DISPATCHER: 1, 2, 3, 4.
00:37:04
MUHAMMAD ALTANTAWI: 1, 2, 3, 4. NARRATOR: Prosecutors
suggested that this was because Muhammad already
knew his mother was dead.
00:37:13
[tense music] Then they highlighted
key evidence from Muhammad
Altantawi's phone.
00:37:22
- Prosecutors knew it would be
extremely difficult to convince a jury that a 16-year-old son
would kill his own mother,
00:37:29
but they had more good
circumstantial evidence, including Muhammad's
phone records.
00:37:34
In fact, he had his
mother in his phone as a contact named "Dog." AYA ALTANTAWI: To call
somebody a dog and your own mom
00:37:44
nonetheless, who did nothing
to deserve that, just why? - Muhammad saving his mother's
name as Dog in his phone
00:37:53
is incredibly
misogynistic language and really implies a hatred
not just towards his mother,
00:38:00
but to women. And I think we can really see
a potential influence there from his father's own
attitudes and behaviors
00:38:08
towards women
in his life and how that might have impacted then
on Muhammad's own opinions
00:38:13
and behaviors, too. NARRATOR: The prosecution
also used Muhammad's phone to demonstrate motive.
00:38:21
- Just weeks before
she was killed, Nada texted her son
Muhammad to tell him she would have to testify
in the divorce case.
00:38:29
She would have to say
truthfully about what happened with abuse and misconduct. Prosecutors argue that Muhammad
wanted to protect his father,
00:38:38
that this had serious legal
and personal implications, that he wanted to stop
Nada from testifying
00:38:44
to protect his father. But there was more
strong evidence. Prosecutors
presented to the jury
00:38:51
that Muhammad took pictures
of the guest room and that open window and sent
them to his father
00:38:57
three weeks before
Nada was killed. Also revealed was further
evidence from his phone.
00:39:02
In the early morning hours
of the day that Nada died, there were phone calls between
Muhammad and his father.
00:39:09
He had told police he was
asleep before learning of his mother's death. AMBER HAQUE: Even though
the trial raised some questions
00:39:17
about what Bassel knew about
what Muhammad was planning to do to Nada,
Bassel Altantawi has
00:39:24
never been charged with
anything in connection to her murder. - Aya testified
at that the trial
00:39:29
about what was going
on in their family five years earlier, when she was only 14.
00:39:35
- I didn't see it as testifying
against my brother. I was there to testify and tell
the truth, and that was it.
00:39:43
One of the things that
I addressed in court while testifying was
the fact that my brother
00:39:48
saw the divorce as being
a splitting the family to two sides. He and our father, and the
other being my mother and I,
00:39:53
and that our agenda was
to destroy our father's life, to take his money,
to take his house,
00:39:58
to ruin his career, his
life, which wasn't the case. NARRATOR: In response
to the prosecution,
00:40:06
Muhammad Altantawi's
defense team laid out their arguments
in an attempt to introduce
00:40:11
reasonable doubt to the jury. They pointed out
that there was no way of proving that
the person in the window
00:40:18
was Muhammad, or even the size,
age, or sex of the person casting the shadow. - The defense also made the
case that Muhammad was skinny,
00:40:28
and there was no way he could
overpower his own mother, who had been working out in a gym.
00:40:34
The defense attorney argued
the timeline was too tight. Nada's body fell
at 5:53 in the morning,
00:40:40
the children woke up at 6:00. Not enough time to commit the
murder, to clean up the scene,
00:40:46
and to hide evidence. NARRATOR: On Monday,
March 14, 2022, after deliberating
for only two hours,
00:40:56
the jury found
Muhammad Altantawi guilty of first-degree
premeditated murder. JIM KIERTZNER: Six months
later at sentencing,
00:41:06
Muhammad continued
to declare his innocence. NARRATOR: Then came
the victim impact
00:41:11
statements from Aya and
Muhammad Altantawi's father, Bassel. AYA ALTANTAWI: He was trying
to use everybody else's story
00:41:18
to gain sympathy, and he
didn't even talk about how he was sad about our mom. He didn't talk about
our mom at all.
00:41:26
NARRATOR: As Bassel
left the courtroom, Aya followed him
to the lobby to confront him.
00:41:32
- I got in his face and I
started yelling at him, and I would have
gladly punched him
00:41:38
if I didn't have six
deputies holding me back, and I wouldn't
have regretted it.
00:41:42
I don't think he understands
why I felt that way. I don't think he
ever will understand
00:41:47
why I felt that
way, because I don't think he's capable
of empathizing with anybody.
00:41:52
I don't think he's
capable of thinking about how other people could
be affected from his actions.
00:41:59
It's sad for me to think
about being related to such pathetic people. NARRATOR: Muhammad was
sentenced to 35 to 60 years
00:42:11
in prison, with
the judge saying he understood the consequences
of his actions and was deserving
of such a stiff penalty.
00:42:20
- I have not had any
contact with my brother since the trial or his
sentencing ended.
00:42:25
Have I thought about it?
Yes. And the only
reason that I would talk to him, again,
not because I want to
00:42:30
but because she was
also his mother. And I recognized that I
am the only person who
00:42:35
would be able to offer
him the opportunity for me to go to her grave and have
him be on the phone
00:42:40
and say whatever he
would want to her. And it doesn't mean
that I like him, that I love him,
that I support him,
00:42:47
that I want anything
to do with him, that I want
a relationship with him. It means absolutely
nothing other
00:42:51
than I'm presenting
you with an opportunity that I don't think anybody
else would give you.
00:42:57
NARRATOR: Since her
mother's death in 2017 and the pain of the trial,
Aya has committed herself
00:43:04
to helping other
victims of crime find justice
for their loved ones. - My career plans are
to go to law school,
00:43:15
become a criminal
prosecutor, and if somebody's going through
something like domestic abuse
00:43:19
or whatever the case might be,
when they feel like they can relate to me or my mom
or any part of anything
00:43:25
that we went through, I
want people to know and see that I might be
biased, but I don't
00:43:33
think I turned
out too terribly, all things considered. And your life isn't
defined by what happens
00:43:40
to you, what people do to you. Your life is what you want it
to be, what you make of it,
00:43:44
and that's all that matters. I remember my mom as somebody
who was incredibly selfless
00:43:55
and kind and caring. And she put
everybody before her and didn't want
anybody to ever worry
00:44:01
about what she
was going through and didn't tell almost anybody
what she was going through.
00:44:05
And I know she
would want everybody that she loved, everybody
in her life to be happy
00:44:12
and to not dwell
on what happened to her. And it sucks that
I don't have her, but knowing that she
can't be here anymore is--
00:44:24
that's enough for me. [melancholy music] [theme music]