CAIRO — Suzanne Tamim shot to fame in an “American Idol”-style TV show, a green-eyed Lebanese beauty whose pop songs about love’s agony mirrored her troubled life.
Now, the man reported to be her secret lover — a married, politically powerful Egyptian tycoon — has been sentenced to hang for paying a former government security agent $2 million to slit her throat.
Billionaire Hisham Talaat Moustafa showed no emotion Thursday as he was convicted and sentenced for ordering the killing of Tamim — the latest chapter in the sordid tale of sex, power, money and murder that was closely followed throughout the Middle East.
Many had wondered whether the 50-year-old real estate mogul tied to President Hosni Mubarak’s son, Gamal, and an influential member of the ruling party, would get away with murder in a region where the rich are often thought to be above the law.
Tamim rose to stardom after appearing in an Arab talent show similar to “American Idol” in 1996. Tamim and Moustafa met in the summer of 2004 at a Red Sea resort, according to transcripts of Moustafa’s interrogation.
Mohsen el-Sukkary, the former security officer, said in the transcripts in the trial that Moustafa was “always with Tamim,” that he kept a hotel suite for her, and that he took her around in his private jet.
Moustafa said they fell in love and that he wanted to marry her in 2006 but then retreated, allegedly over his mother’s objections, and they broke up.
Tamim left Egypt, moved to London and hooked up with a kickboxer. But Tamim still felt threatened by the jealous tycoon, and she eventually ended up in Dubai. There, prosecutors say, el-Sukkary stalked and killed her at Moustafa’s behest.
El-Sukkary faces the gallows too.
