Abu Dhabi residents were shocked this winter when an American schoolteacher was stabbed to death in a restroom at the Reem Island shopping mall by a perpetrator dubbed "The Reem Island Ghost." Within a short time, the female Emirati suspect – Alaa Al Hashemi – was caught and apparently confessed.
Now Hashemi has seen her first days in court and claims that she is "possessed by evil spirits." She has requested psychological assistance for an illness that she claims she has struggled with since the age of 3 or 4.
Denying all charges against her, Hashemi has requested to be examined by a doctor. According to The National she said, “I act without thinking or realizing."
“I have had this illness since I was as young as 3 or 4 years. I started seeing women, speaking to them and playing with them.”
In addition to the murder of the schoolteacher, Hashemi is accused of attempting to murder an Egyptian-American doctor and his family with a homemade bomb she constructed and left outside their apartment.
Authorities have stated that Hashemi ascribed to "jihadi ideology and then engaged in terrorist acts in support of the terrorist organizations."
Here is the original arrest video that the UAE Interior Ministry made in December. If it reminds you of Law and Order, you are not alone: