CHICAGO: The 26-year-old son of Egypt’s Minister of Immigration and Expatriate Affairs, Nabila Makram, is facing charges of premeditated murder over the killing of two men in California in April.
Ramy Hani Mounir Fahim, who lives in Irvine, California, has also been charged with two enhancements each of lying in wait and the personal use of a deadly weapon after a co-worker and his roommate were stabbed to death in their Anaheim apartment early last month.
The special circumstances of “lying in wait” and multiple murders make Fahim eligible for the death penalty, officials said.
Police allege that Fahim attacked and killed his co-worker, 23-year-old Griffin Cuomo, then killed Cuomo’s roommate, 23-year-old Jonathan Bahm, in their Anaheim apartment at about 6:30 a.m. on April 19, 2022.
Cuomo and Fahim worked together at an Orange County company, Pence Wealth Management. Fahim was a data engineer who had been employed as a research associate at the firm.
He is being held without bail at the Intake Release Center and was arraigned on May 6 at the North Justice Center in Fullerton, California.
According to investigators, a building security guard encountered Fahim on the apartment complex roof at midnight on April 18, just hours before the murders. Fahim was seen on the same floor of the victims’ apartment on the morning of the killings.
Fahim was still inside the victims’ apartment when Anaheim police responded to a 911 emergency call, Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer said.
“These young men were just starting to live out their dreams and find their places in the world. But an intruder who stalked them and then slashed them to death in their own home interrupted those dreams,” Spitzer said.
“The callous way that two young lives were ended cannot be ignored and we will do everything we can to ensure justice is served.”
Egypt’s Minister of Immigration and Expatriate Affairs, Nabila Makram, issued a statement on Facebook on Saturday, saying that she and her family are going through “a severe ordeal.”
In the statement, the minister’s first since Fahim was arrested on April 22, Makram called for prayers for her son and the two victims, and said that she will continue her duties as minister.
“My family and I are under severe distress following my son being charged with murder in the US. This charge is in front of a US court and a sentence has not yet been issued,” she said.
“Doing my duties as a minister in the Egyptian government does not conflict at all with me being a believing mother who bravely faces the plight of her son. Whatever the consequences, as a minister, I take full responsibility for my position and the requirements of working with it, and I clearly differentiate between what is personal and what is public.”
Fahim will remain in custody until a bail review hearing scheduled for June 17.