Magdi Girgis was a respiratory therapist who moved to the United States from Egypt with his wife Ariet in an arranged marriage. They had two sons, Richard and Ryan, and lived in Westminster, California. But behind the facade of a successful immigrant family, there was a dark and violent reality. Magdi Girgis was an abusive husband and father who paid two men to brutally slash his wife to death in 2004.
The Abuse and the Divorce
According to The Cinemaholic, Magdi Girgis was a controlling and domineering man who would demand his wife to surrender her paycheck to him and give her a limited allowance. He also spent most of his time at work and neglected his family. In 2004, he allegedly hit Ariet in an argument over money, leaving her with a black eye and a broken nose. Ariet filed for a restraining order against Magdi and decided to divorce him. Magdi moved out of the house soon after.
The Murder and the Arrest
On September 29, 2004, two men broke into the Girgis home where Ariet and her youngest son Ryan, who was 17 at the time, were sleeping. One of the men tied up Ryan with a shoelace and locked him in a closet, while the other one stabbed and slashed Ariet with such force that she was nearly decapitated. The intruders did not rob the house, indicating that it was a targeted attack.
The police suspected Magdi Girgis of orchestrating the murder, as he had a motive to get rid of his wife who was going to take away his assets and his practicing license in the divorce. However, they did not have enough evidence to arrest him. The case went cold for several years, until a DNA breakthrough in 2011 matched the shoelace to Anthony Edward Bridget, one of the hired killers. In 2013, an undercover cop posed as a friend of Bridget and demanded $5000 from Magdi Girgis to keep the contract killing a secret. Magdi Girgis paid the money and was arrested.
The Trial and the Sentence
In 2014, Magdi Girgis was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He maintained his innocence and told the judge, “you are about to sentence an innocent man, and God is my witness in that.” His sons, however, urged the judge to give him the harshest punishment possible. They said they were afraid of their father and that he had ruined their lives. Richard Girgis told his father that he forgave him and asked him to confess.
In 2018, Anthony Edward Bridget was also sentenced to life in prison for his role in the murder. The third man, who actually killed Ariet, remains at large.
The Ethnicity and the Motive
Magdi Girgis and his wife Ariet were immigrants from Egypt, a country in North Africa that has a diverse and complex ethnic composition. According to AncientFaces, the Girgis surname is derived from the Greek name Georgios, meaning “farmer” or “earth-worker”. It is a common name among Coptic Christians, who are the largest religious minority in Egypt. The Copts have faced discrimination and persecution in Egypt for centuries, and many of them have emigrated to other countries in search of freedom and opportunities.
However, Magdi Girgis’s ethnicity did not seem to play a significant role in his motive for killing his wife. Rather, it was his greed, selfishness, and cruelty that drove him to commit such a heinous crime. He did not care about his wife’s happiness or his sons’ well-being. He only cared about his money and his reputation. He was willing to pay strangers to murder his wife, rather than respect her decision to divorce him. He was a cold-blooded killer who betrayed his family and his faith.