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The ex-wife of a serial killer convicted of murdering and torturing several sex workers has made a desperate plea to help locate her son.
Lobna Yakout, 33, was married to Karim Selim for six years before she left the relationship, with Yakout taking their young son Zayn to live with her when she moved out of their home in Cairo, Egypt.
But a year later, she claims the six-year-old boy was “kidnapped” during a visit with his father.
Despite her desperate attempts to get him back, the distraught mother says she “hasn’t seen him since”.
The situation became even more fraught after British-born Yakout fled to her native country after Selim allegedly threatened her with repeated violence.
Yakout posted a video on TikTok detailing the matter. tiktok/@whenboredomstruckThings escalated even more when the 37-year-old was arrested, and later convicted, for drugging, sexually abusing and murdering three women in a soundproof room inside his upscale home.
His crimes reportedly “sent shockwaves” through the conservative Arab country after it was discovered Selim engaged in sexual acts with his unnamed women both before, and after, their deaths.
Video recordings of his necrophiliac acts with the victims’ dead bodies, as well as CCTV footage showing Selim on his way to and from disposing of the bodies, were shown in court, earning the convicted murderer several disturbing nicknames, including the “New Cairo Serial Killer”.
“I didn’t believe it. I thought he set it up because he did everything to find me … so I’d return to Egypt and he’d get me,” she told People recently.
“Me and my mom, we were shaken, it was madness.”
But even after Selim’s horrors were exposed – the former teacher is currently awaiting his upheld death sentence in an Egyptian jail – Yakout claims she’s been unable to regain custody of her son, now 10 years old.
In a viral TikTok video titled, “I was married to a serial killer for seven and a half years”, the mom states that she has filed all necessary paperwork with the authorities, but he is still with his paternal grandmother who she has been unable to locate.
“When he was locked up, he told the police that I was dead, so his mom took my son… I have every single right, I have full custody, but I just cannot find this woman,” she claimed in the clip that has been viewed 22.5 million times.
Yakout claims the six-year-old boy was “kidnapped” during a visit with his father. tiktok/@whenboredomstruckShe also detailed how she was separated from her son, alleging her ex-husband “tried to kill me every time I tried to get to him (Zayn)”.
“It was a nightmare, he would show up at places and I would have to run.
“I’m dying to see my son, I’m dying to talk to him again. I need my son back.”
During her interview with People, Yakout described the last exchange she had with Zayn before he disappeared.
“If you’re taken from me, find me, that’s the last thing I said to him,” she claimed.
Prior to his conviction, Selim had amassed a large following on TikTok teaching American slang words, which some have since branded “creepy” and “disturbing”.
Statistically, about 7.8 million Egyptian women undergo a form of gender-based violence every year, according to a UN survey released in 2015.
Cairo has also been described as “the world’s most dangerous megacity for women”.
English (US)