Ramanodge Unmathallegadoo, who was found guilty by a London jury last week, was sentenced Friday to life in prison with a minimum term of 33 years. The sentence comes a year after he shot his ex-wife with a crossbow as she was running up the stairs in her home, according to the city’s Metropolitan Police.
Authorities said the 18-inch bolt struck Sana Muhammad’s hip and traveled through her body, but it missed the unborn baby by “extreme fortune.” Medical personnel conducted an emergency C-section and were able to save the baby.
The 35-year-old woman sustained injuries to her stomach, liver and heart and died of a heart attack, authorities said.
“The baby is now a healthy one-year-old,” Sgt. Amjad Sharif said in a statement. “However, he will grow up without a mother, as will his five siblings.”
The killer had an arranged marriage to the victim in the east African island nation of Mauritius when she was 16 and he was 30, according to The Guardian. Their marriage ended in 2012, around the same time Unmathallegadoo was accused of trying to strangle her, the Guardian reported.
The woman later married Imitiaz Muhammad and had two children with him. It was Muhammad who first saw the ex-husband on their property the night of the murder.
Police said the widower saw Unmathallegadoo hiding in a garden shed and immediately told his wife to run. The woman tried to run up the stairs, but she was struck before reaching the second floor.
The unhinged killer, who’s now 51, can only apply for parole after serving 33 years in prison.
“Ramanodge Unmathallegadoo is now likely to spend the majority of the rest of his life in prison,” Sharif, who led the investigation, said in the statement. “This is the appropriate punishment for the cold and calculated way in which he killed his ex-wife, Sana Muhammad.”
NEW YORK TIMES DAILY
