00:00Hello and welcome to the Dark Mystery Lounge.
00:03Today we have a rare treat.
00:05We're going to take a trip to Egypt, specifically Alexandria.
00:08Alexandria is a beautiful city on the Mediterranean coast, founded by Alexander the Great back in 331 BC.
00:15It's a slice of paradise that history buffs would love to explore,
00:19from the ruins of the lighthouse to the library of Alexandria,
00:22beautiful mosques and churches, lots of restaurants and shops.
00:26There's always something to do.
00:27But what if I told you there was a dark side to this ancient city?
00:30Yes, we are going to explore the lives of Egypt's first female serial killers, Rhea and Skeena.
00:37They were the ringleaders of a small gang,
00:39and they were quite clever in how they managed to pull off the schemes they did and for so long.
00:45Let's go ahead and take a look, shall we?
00:47Rhea and Skeena Ali Hammam were born in a remote village in Upper Egypt.
00:58Rhea was born in 1875, and Skeena was born ten years later in 1885.
01:04They lived with their mother and brother, and their father abandoned them at a young age.
01:08They lived in poverty and struggled to get by.
01:10Their mother often sent the sisters out to sell roasted vegetables to try and make money.
01:15Their mother was an eccentric lady.
01:17She didn't show much affection towards her children.
01:20They moved around quite often until they settled in Khafer al-Zayyad,
01:25which is located on the delta of the Nile River.
01:28They stayed there until they both got married.
01:30But married life was rough.
01:32Skeena and her husband divorced.
01:34She left the village and moved to the large city of Tenta.
01:37She worked as a prostitute at a brothel until she met Muhammad Abdullah.
01:41They soon got married and moved to Alexandria.
01:44Meanwhile, Rhea was still living in the village and got married to Hezbollah,
01:48who was the brother of her dead husband.
01:50He was a thief and a smuggler and was often in trouble with the authorities.
01:54Because of all the trouble he was causing, Hezbollah and Rhea were banished from there.
01:59So they went to live with her sister and her husband in Alexandria.
02:09Times were tough during World War I.
02:11Alexandria was a major port city, but it was becoming harder to export cotton.
02:16And so because of this, major cotton manufacturers started laying off its workers.
02:20Both Rhea and Skeena's husband worked in the cotton industry, so they were soon out of a job.
02:25So they had to figure out a way to make money.
02:27The sisters came up with an idea of opening up a brothel,
02:30where people could come and indulge in drugs, drinking, and sex.
02:34The first one was open near a British army base known as The Camp.
02:39Soldiers, businessmen, married men, and women often frequented The Camp,
02:43mainly to get away from their spouses.
02:45And business was looking good.
02:47So as more soldiers came in, they opened up four more brothels in different parts of the city.
02:52Of course, prostitution is illegal in Egypt, and if anyone asked the sisters about it,
02:57they would deny having anything to do with any immoral behavior.
03:00And to keep the neighbors quiet who disapproved of what they were doing,
03:04they hired protection.
03:05Arabi and Abdul Razik.
03:07But as the war ended, their business started to slow to a crawl.
03:11And even though they were under British occupation, Egypt was pushing for independence.
03:15There was an uprising in March of 1919 against the British,
03:20which resulted in strikes and curfews.
03:22The economy started to suffer, as did the sisters' business,
03:25that they had spent five years building.
03:27It got so bad that they had to resort to stealing food just to get by,
03:31which Hezbollah and Raya were caught and spent six months in prison.
03:35They didn't want to give up their comfortable lives,
03:37so they had to come up with a new plan.
03:39At the time, Alexandria's elite did not deposit their money in banks.
03:50Instead, they invested in gold jewelry and wore it on their neck, wrists, ankles, and hands.
03:55The plan was to find the most decorated woman in the market,
03:58have one of the sisters strike up a conversation.
04:01If the woman was receptive, then she would lure them into their house,
04:04offer them a drink, which was laced with drugs, to knock them out,
04:07and steal the jewelry, which they would, in turn, sell the jewelry to a local jeweler for cash.
04:12But, of course, you can't just rob them and leave them to tell the police what happened,
04:17so they would have to kill them and dispose of their bodies somewhere.
04:20Each member of the gang would have a role to play.
04:23Raya or Skeena would approach the women, offer them wares for cheap, or promise of alcohol.
04:29Some of these women actually knew them, so they never suspected anything.
04:33Once they were at one of the homes, and they were drunk or knocked out from the drugs,
04:37the men would attack the woman, pinning her down and stuffing a wet cloth in her mouth and nose until she stopped breathing.
04:44Then they would strip her of everything, clothes, jewelry, and anything else she happened to have on her.
04:50Afterwards, the men would remove the tiles from the floor, dig a hole, bury the corpse in it, and reset the tile.
04:56They sold the jewelry to a local jeweler, Ali Hassan, and divided the money amongst the six of them.
05:02The gang's first victim, Hanim, Raya's neighbor, who had bought some new jewelry, which provoked Raya's jealousy.
05:09Following the murder, Raya went to fetch her sister, who was elsewhere at the time.
05:14Once Skeena arrived to Raya's home, Skeena found her husband, brother-in-law, and the other two gang members digging a grave.
05:21She then turned to Hanim's body, lying open-eyed beneath a bench, and was about to scream when Raya threatened to do the same to her if she uttered a word.
05:31Skeena was handed her share of the loot, which amounted to three Egyptian pounds.
05:36This pattern seemed to pay off until the missing persons reports started coming in to the police.
05:41The first missing persons report that came in to the police was filed by a mother of 25-year-old Nazla Abu Aleil,
05:50who was wearing gold wristlets, a silver anklet, gold earrings, and two gold rings when she went missing.
05:57After this, a man reported his sister, Zanuba, went to the market, met Raya, and never returned.
06:03A young 15-year-old girl reported her mother, a poultry woman, went missing.
06:08This report was followed by that of a man, whose 50-year-old wife, Fatma Abdrabu, went missing.
06:15She had 54 pounds on her, 18 gold wristlets, a couple of gold bracelets, and a pair of earrings.
06:22The next victim was a kerosene seller, who was living alone in Il-Leban.
06:28The missing persons reports kept pouring in.
06:30This time, a Sudanese woman reported her daughter missing in mysterious circumstances.
06:35She was wearing 60 pounds worth of jewelry, gold bracelets costing 35 pounds, earrings, and a gold necklace.
06:43Police were successful in finding out where she had gone to before she went missing.
06:48Gina's name was mentioned, and she was brought in for interrogation.
06:53However, she denied all allegations and threw police off her tracks.
06:57On the morning of December 11, 1920, a passerby discovered human remains on the side of the road.
07:03The body was damaged beyond recognition except for the long hair, and was completely dismembered.
07:09There was also a piece of black cloth and a striped black and white pair of socks near the body.
07:14However, these items did not help with identification of the remains.
07:18It was only when the owner of a house, which was previously rented by Skeena, reported to police that he had discovered the remains of a woman while digging the floor to repair a drain.
07:34Police started growing suspicious.
07:36They paid a visit to where Rhea was living.
07:39They noticed a powerful smell of incense burning.
07:41They asked about the incense.
07:43Rhea said it was to cover the smell of her customers who drank alcohol and smoked.
07:48After taking a look around, the police noticed some of the floor tiles had been replaced.
07:53After going back to the police department to speak with his supervisor, a team of police went back to Rhea's apartment to remove the tiles.
08:00Soon, they were hit with an overpowering smell of decomposing bodies.
08:04They found three women.
08:05Police arrested Rhea and Skeena, their husbands, and the two other men involved.
08:10They then went to each of the homes that they stayed in and found more bodies buried in a similar fashion.
08:17In all, 17 bodies were recovered, but only 10 were identified.
08:21The seven that were not identified were probably runaways or prostitutes, at least according to the police.
08:27Both sisters tried to blame each other during their interrogations, but it was Rhea's nine-year-old daughter that was the most credible witness.
08:41She saw everything unfold from the crack in the wall, along with many other witnesses that last saw the missing women in the company of Rhea or Skeena before their disappearance.
08:51Their fate was sealed.
08:52News spread like wildfire in the papers, many expressing their opinion as to whether or not women should receive the death sentence.
09:00The trial started on May 10, 1921.
09:03The prosecution outlined the crimes to the courts and produced those same witnesses that last saw the missing women in the company of Rhea or Skeena before their disappearance.
09:13The defense had a very weak case. Six out of nine witnesses decided against testifying.
09:19After three days of testimony, the trial ended with the sisters and their husbands being found guilty of murder.
09:26Four days later, on May 16, the chief magistrate sentenced them to death.
09:31The two bodyguards also got the death penalty as well.
09:34But the jeweler who purchased the jewelry from the sisters got five years in prison.
09:39On December 21, 1921, Rhea and Skeena were hanged.
09:43They were the first women to be executed by the modern state of Egypt.
09:47The following day, their husbands met the same fate.
09:55Unfortunately, Rhea's daughter was placed in an orphanage.
09:58She died a few years later from a mysterious fire.
10:01Even though there were many serial killers lurking around during the British control over Egypt,
10:06these two sisters stood out because of their heinous crimes.
10:10The fact that they were ringleaders of a small gang and that they were women.
10:14There are movies and plays written about them.
10:17I can only imagine the terror of living in that time.
10:20In the El Aban district, after hearing about the first disappearance,
10:23I would have hid every single piece of jewelry I owned.
10:26But that is the story of Rhea and Skeena and their reign of terror that happened over 100 years ago.
10:36I tell you, the more I read about this case, the more fascinated I became.
10:40I mean, I lived in Alexandria for two years,
10:43and I didn't even know about this case until after I came back to the States.
10:46It just goes to show that murder is universal.
10:49No country is 100% crime-free.
10:51But I don't think of Egypt any less because of this.
10:54I mean, we are all human.
10:56I still love the history, the food, and all the great memories I have from being there.
11:01And with that being said,
11:02so what did you think of this case?
11:04Which case would you like for me to cover next?
11:06Let me know in the comments down below.
11:08And if you enjoyed this video,
11:10please like, comment, and subscribe,
11:12and tickle that little bell icon so that you don't miss the next episode.
11:16You never know who I will cover next.
11:18Thank you for hanging out with me in the Dark Mystery Lounge.
11:20This is Phoenix, signing out.
11:22Have a good evening, and stay safe.
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