The court of cassation upheld the death sentence for an Ethiopian maid accused of murdering citizen Seham Humoud Flaiteh. The case drew national attention in March of last year when the domestic worker stabbed her employer’s teenage daughter to death in Sulaibikhat.

The suspect, identified as 22-year-old Rabiya Mahmoud, turned herself in at Sulaibikhat police station at 5:45 am that morning. She admitted killing 19-year-old Seham, daughter of former Kuwaiti national football team defender Hmoud Flaiteh Al-Shemmari, earlier that morning. She confirmed that the murder happened at Shemmari’s house where she worked as a housemaid. She told officers that she stabbed the victim multiple times in the girl’s bedroom while she was asleep, then locked her inside the room before leaving her employer’s house. She also handed over the knife she used in the crime. She also confessed that she had planned the murder days earlier and that her plans had been delayed because of the presence of the victim’s younger sister.

The victim’s father was a member of the Kuwait national team that participated in the 1982 World Cup. He served as the Deputy Director General for Youth Affairs at the Public Authority for Youth and Sports. Lawmakers at the time were quick to call for the banning of all Ethiopian domestic labor in Kuwait.