‘I loved him absolutely... he really was everything’

Murder victim’s widow reveals pain

The heartbroken widow of tragic Caldercruix man Mohammed Sammour has revealed “every day is a challenge without him”.

Scott Pearson, 22, was found guilty last week of murdering Mohammed, 49, as he worked as a security supervisor by reversing over him in a van at a housing development in Newarthill last October.

Mohammed’s widow, and mother of his four children, Fidaa, 40, has revealed her husband was a “quiet, friendly man” who “always talked so positively about Scotland” and added: “I did not think that such a man could be murdered in this country.”

Judge Lord Burns told killer Pearson he is facing a life tariff behind bars but deferred sentencing until next month for background reports.

Devastated Fidaa says that when a police officer told her Mohammed had been murdered, four words embedded in her mind.

She explained: “He told me they had found a dead body and a burned van. Dead body, burned van; those words told me everything.

“My husband was dead and it was not a normal death. It was such a terrible shock.”

Mohammed had been killed during what should have been a routine shift as a security guard supervisor.

Palestinians raised in Jordan’s capital of Amman, the couple had known each other since they were children.

Fidaa said: “Mohammed was a quiet and friendly man. I loved him, absolutely. He was everything to me.

“He was my family, my husband, the friend I turned to day and night; he was my Google, my fixer, the person I phoned if I was lost, my interpreter when I couldn’t find an English word.

“He really was everything. Every day is a challenge without him.”

Pearson was found guilty of murdering Mohammed, while acting with two others.

Co-accused Ryan Hunter had already admitted culpable homicide over the death of Mohammed after he was brutally attacked, being left “partially scalped” and with leg and rib injuries after being dragged from his van, hit with a brick and reversed over while he lay unconscious. He died from chest, head and pelvic wounds.

Mohammed was set upon after confronting an 18- year- old – who cannot be named for legal reasons – who had used a knuckle duster to smash a window in his van.

Mr Sammour had lived in Scotland for 17 years; it was his home and he had made many friends.

He married in 2006 and Fidaa, a computer scientist, gave up her job in Jordan to join him in Scotland; he assured her it was a welcoming country.

Mohammed immersed himself in the community, was kind and generous with his time, taking friends’ children to

It was 6pm when police officers came to Fidaa’s house. She added: “I believed it immediately when they said he was dead because I knew that, otherwise, he would have found a way to contact me no matter what.”

Each day during Pearson’s trial at the High Court in Glasgow, Fidaa sat beside her lawyer Aamer Anwar and surrounded by women from the Muslim community who had filled the rows around her in solidarity.

She said: “At least I felt that someone was trying to help me and be there to

True love Fidaa and Mohammed had been married for 13 years