By: Richard L. Smith
A 33-year-old man from Lindenwold has been sentenced to 90 years in state prison for the murder of a Camden man in a Mount Laurel hotel room four years ago.
The sentence was delivered on Friday by Judge Terrence R. Cook in Superior Court in Mount Holly, according to an announcement from Burlington County Prosecutor LaChia L. Bradshaw.
The convicted man, Jawaad Ali, along with two co-defendants, lured 31-year-old Samer Alhalayqa to the Fairfield Inn on Century Parkway on the night of May 8, 2020.
Once inside a third-floor hotel room, Alhalayqa was suffocated and his body was later dragged into the hallway.
Ali and his accomplices then used Alhalayqa's debit card to withdraw money, order items from Amazon, and purchase pizza.
Ali, who chose to represent himself during the trial, was found guilty in June of multiple charges, including first-degree murder, robbery, kidnapping, and desecration of human remains, among others.
The jury took just two hours to reach a verdict.
The two co-defendants, Asia Boone and Anthony Sermond-Guyton, both pleaded guilty and are awaiting sentencing.
They were prosecuted by Assistant Prosecutor Jamie Hutchinson, while Ali's prosecution was led by Assistant Prosecutors Nicole C. Lister and David Kras Bakardjiev.
The investigation into the crime was a joint effort by the Burlington County Prosecutor’s Office and the Mount Laurel Police Department, with significant contributions from Detective Sergeant Brian Cunningham of the BCPO and Detective Sergeant Sean Bristow of the MLPD.