An Egyptian historian is preparing a 500-page book on two Egyptian women, the first and the most famous female serial killers in the country, who in the 1920s were executed for for taking part robbing and murdering 17 women in Alexandria.
Salah Eissa told Egypt Today that the story of the two sisters Rayy and Sekina Hammam, which was featured in a number of plays and movies through the decades since it shook Egypt, is not yet known in details. He said that he will base his bok on police records.
"What most people don't know," said Eissa, "is that Rayya and Sekina did not actually commit any of those murders." As the facts indicate, their role was limited to luring the victims. The real killers were Hasaballah El Sayed, Rayya's husband, Mohammed Abdel Aal, Sekina's husband, and two other accomplices, one named Oraby Hassan and the other known only as Abdel Razek.
According to the magazine, the image in people's minds is mostly shaped by the way the story was adapted in the media, and on theater and movie screen since 1923 when two comedians, Naguib El-Rihany and Badie Khairy, staged the first play about the serial killings. The last was “all-time favorite play” Rayya Wi Sekina, starring singer Shadia and comedian Soheir El-Bably, which ran in Alexandria for almost seven years.
Based on his research, Eissa refutes the psychological hypotheses, postulating the theory that social and political circumstances were the real reasons behind these crimes. He said that “dire poverty combined with the unstable political situation following the 1919 Revolution, during which time the divided authority slackened the power of civilian police, culminated in these atrocities.”
“The sisters' husbands and accomplices were also mercenaries who joined the ranks of the British army to dig trenches during World War I. This had the double impact of making them indifferent to human life, as well as having money, so they could not withstand the poverty they experienced when their services were no longer required,” he said – Albawaba.com
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