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On Christmas Eve 2014, 34-year-old Sameena Imam was excitedly getting ready for the festive holiday ahead. As she ran out for some last minute items, she had no way of knowing that by 6:30 pm, she would be dead.
In 2014, Sameena had been carrying a big secret; over the past two years she had been having an affair with her colleague, 41-year-old Roger Cooper. The couple met while working together at Costco in Coventry, England where Roger worked as a manager & Sameena, a regional marketing manager who covered stores in Cardiff, Southampton, Bristol & Coventry. Things were especially complicated as not only was Roger in a long-term relationship with his live-in partner, but he was also involved with a third woman, another colleague he managed at Costco. On top of that, it is against the rules for senior members of the staff to date.
As time went on & their relationship continued to evolve, Sameena found herself growing restless. She was growing weary of being the other woman, of keeping their relationship a secret. Much of their time spent together was at Sameena’s place or if they did go out, they always had to go somewhere out of town so they wouldn’t be recognized. With this restlessness, she finally wanted a commitment from Roger, something he had been promising her for some time, so she gave him an ultimatum as the 2014 holiday season began approaching. He was to leave his long-term girlfriend or their relationship was over. Roger agreed & Sameena was excited to finally have a fresh start with the freedom of openly dating, rather than being Roger’s dirty little secret.
In late November 2014, believing that she & Roger would finally have the opportunity to be a real couple by the time Christmas arrived, Sameena booked a two-night stay at Birmingham’s Malmaison Hotel for a romantic getaway. When she paid £500 for a two-night stay between December 24 & 25, she confirmed the booking by choosing the options from the hotel’s Christmas Day dinner menu. Sameena was elated, so excited to have one-on-one time with the man she loved.
When she headed out from the office at 4 pm on Christmas Eve, Wednesday, December 24, 2014, Sameena needed to run a few last minute errands in preparation for the holiday & her trip. She stopped off for a few last items at Marks & Spencer, a British retailer that sells clothing, home goods & food, where she picked up a bottle of bellini & some chocolates.
Sameena & Roger had each left work at the same time, driving off in their separate cars. When they met up again nearby, Sameena transferred her luggage from her BMW to Roger’s Audi. She left her car along a quiet side street & the couple drove off together towards Leicester to quickly see Roger’s brother, 39-year-old David Cooper, before they headed to their hotel in Birmingham.
On their way over to David’s, Sameena spoke with her sister in what ended up being their last conversation. She asked how their mom was doing after a recent surgery & they discussed Boxing Day, which was two days from then on December 26, since they all planned to gather at their parent’s house for their annual family Christmas celebration.
Boxing Day is a holiday that originated in the UK as a day to donate gifts to those in need, but it has since evolved to become part of Christmas festivities where it’s celebrated in several Commonwealth nations in addition to the UK. The name may have come from the tradition of giving gifts in boxes to people who had to work on Christmas Day & were given the following day off.
However, when Sameena didn’t arrive at her parent’s house in Essex two days later to celebrate Boxing Day & her family wasn’t able to reach her, they notified the police. Very quickly, investigators were able to track Sameena’s cellphone data to Leicester where David Cooper lived. When they came by his house, they found the bottle of bellini Sameena had purchased on Christmas Eve in his refrigerator while the snacks she purchased were in his cupboard & her navigation system was in his loft.
When Roger spoke with investigators on January 1 into the 2nd, he indicated that after he & Sameena left work on Christmas Eve at about 4 pm, he called her to cancel their trip. Although she seemed disappointed, she wasn’t as angry as he expected her to be & he tearfully told investigators that this was the last time he heard her voice. He claimed that he hadn’t realized she was missing until the evening of Boxing Day.
When investigators spoke with David as a witness on January 4, he said he didn’t even know Sameena’s name, he only knew that his brother was having an affair with her. He believed he had met her two times before.
Roger & David Cooper were arrested on suspicion of murder on January 7, 2015, two weeks after Sameena vanished. About three weeks after her disappearance, investigators began searching an allotment, or a plot of land off of Groby Road that David utilized based on a tip that came through on January 11, 2015. A friend of David’s had contacted the police to report that he had given her a set of keys before he was arrested that were for a property on Groby Road in Leicester. On January 16, during the fourth day of excavations, investigators found the outside edge of a sleeping bag & immediately knew that they’d found Sameena’s remains.
In an eerie twist, at the property where Sameena’s body was found in a shallow grave, there was a sign inside a shed that read, Don’t wind me up.. I’m running out of places to hide the bodies.
After the body was confirmed to be that of Sameena, it was determined that she died from chloroform toxicity. There was also a bizarre combination of elements found in her blood samples, including antimony, cadmium, tin, mercury & arsenic that were suspected to have been either ingested or administered to her in a liquid form.
Sameena’s father Din paid tribute to his daughter & said that their entire family was absolutely devastated. He described Sameena as someone who meant so much to her sisters, brothers, nieces, nephews, family & friends. He couldn’t understand how such a kind, innocent, beautiful girl could be murdered & he couldn’t fathom that she would never be coming home again. Their minds whirled with the thoughts of what her last moments involved, what her final thoughts & fears were.
Roger & David were charged with Sameena’s murder on January 9, one week before her body was found. The following day, David requested a further interview with detectives where he made a partial confession. During this recorded interview, he detailed how he attacked Sameena on his sofa after she & Roger arrived at his Leicester home on Hughenden Drive at 5 pm on Christmas Eve.
Being wintertime, it was already dark outside by the time they arrived. He callously told the officer that although he had met Sameena twice, he went on to say, This lady, I didn’t know her name. She died on my sofa. He went on to say that his brother had come around & shortly after, he heard knocking on the door again. He only opened the door because he assumed it was Roger coming back, otherwise he wouldn’t have because he doesn’t like people.
When he opened the door, he said he saw a woman there that he knew was associated with his brother & she was there, looking for Roger. Meanwhile, he guided her over to his sofa & offered her a cup of tea, but she wasn’t interested. He indicated that she was complaining about the fact that she & Roger had plans & she didn’t know where he was.
With Sameena standing at only 5’2” vs. Roger, who stood at 6’5” & David, at 6’7”, she wouldn’t have stood a chance against them. According to David, he went to the kitchen where he had a 200mL bottle of chloroform, something that he purchased on eBay for £12, in addition to the copper powder he purchased weeks beforehand. Since he had seen things like this on TV, he figured the chloroform would be useful in keeping Sameena quiet because his walls are paper thin & she continued to yell & carry on.
Since she wouldn’t accept the tea he offered her, he said that he got a bucket & poured the chloroform over a tea towel. He walked over to the couch where she was sitting, placed the towel over her face, sat on her lap & when she put her arms up in self-defense, he forced them down. He admitted that he wasn’t sure how the chloroform would work or how long she would be unconscious for, but when he realized she wasn’t waking up, he fumbled around looking for a pulse, something he had only seen happen on TV.
David told the officers that the chloroform was freezing cold & burning his hand & everything was all wrong. He claimed to have called his friend, Ben, who had a van, who disposed of Sameena’s body. He said that he placed her remains in his sleeping bag & after her body was removed from his house, he wasn’t sure what happened to it, but he believed that it was buried in woodland. Since he wasn’t from Leicester, he didn’t know it well, but he thought his friend said something about Smithland woods. He told officers that he never cleaned his sofa or did any sort of coverup of the crime.
Investigators feel that David’s story was only the partial truth as they believe that just after Sameena & Roger walked into David’s house at 5 pm, both men attacked her. While Roger held her down, David went to the kitchen, poured chloroform on a towel & then held it to Sameena’s face with a lethal dose. As he did, David told her, Just a couple of breaths, before her fighting ceased & she grew still.
By 6:25 pm, Roger had already started his journey home to Coventry, leaving David to dispose of Sameena’s remains.
During his confession, David claimed that Sameena’s death had been an accident. However, he later changed his account entirely when he told jurors that he only found her body after he was asked to move a car.
According to pathologists, Sameena’s body had been transferred to the grave where it was later recovered within hours of her death. On a quiet plot of land on Groby Road in Leicester, her remains were found wrapped in cling wrap as well as an old Army sleeping bag.
Two days after David & Roger murdered Sameena, it was Boxing Day, the day her family reported her missing, when David drove to Coventry to pick up Sameena’s BMW. He drove it back to his house before abandoning it in Luton the following day. After he left her car, he took a taxi to the Luton Parkway train station & traveled back to Leicester. When he went back to her car a second time, three days later on December 29, he moved it once again & this time, he used a cleaning product to wipe away any DNA or fingerprints. Investigators found Sameena’s car on January 4, 2015 along a quiet residential street, about 65 miles from Coventry.
Sameena’s handbag & suitcases that she packed for what she believed was going to be a romantic getaway, were missing. Not only was her car free of any fingerprints, but the driver’s seat had been pushed back to a position that Sameena would have been unable to reach.
Police officers found a series of Star Wars-related phrases on a cell phone that was linked to David & in court, Roger admitted that in one message, when they spoke about Darth Vader, they were referring to Sameena. Their text messages also referenced an aborted mission. They also wrote, Death Star complete, Stay on target, stay on target. You are expected Vader. The court heard that both men had a genuine interest in Star Wars models & action figures.
In regards to the reference of an aborted mission, investigators learned that Roger & David had made two previous attempts to take Sameena’s life before they’d been successful on Christmas Eve. The first attempt was on December 11, three days after David purchased chloroform online & the second attempt was on December 21.
On December 11, Roger invited Sameena to meet him at a hotel & meanwhile, David waited in the parking lot, planning to abduct & murder her. Authorities believe their mission was aborted after Sameena’s taxi dropped her off too close to the hotel entrance for David to pounce on her.
After Sameena’s murder, Roger went back home to spend the holiday with his partner where he sent false text messages from Sameena’s phone to create an illusion that she was still alive. Pretending to be Sameena, he wrote, I am fuming. I am going to where I am truly cared for. This was to give the impression that Sameena had been angry after Roger called off their two-night hotel stay. One day after they murdered her, he also texted, Merry Christmas, to establish that he believed his colleague was alive & well.
During the eight-week long trial that concluded on October 21, 2015, all of the details as to what led to Sameena’s death were revealed.
Roger told jurors at the Birmingham Crown Court that the last time he saw Sameena was when he’d made her angry while they had been at his brother’s house. He told her that while she was staying at the Premier Inn on December 11, he had her watched. Rather than seeing the funny side, as he expected her to, she instead got angry & wanted to leave. While he drove her back to Coventry, she sat in the backseat of his car, shouting at him & growing hysterical.
Roger claimed that he last saw her when he dropped her off near a Tesco store close to the end of the M69. He admitted that he’d lied during his initial interview when he indicated that he last saw Sameena when they’d each left Costco on Christmas Eve at 4 pm, going their separate ways. He claimed that he hadn’t told them about the trip to his brother’s house because he just assumed that she was sulking somewhere.
Roger claimed that he ended things with Sameena as he didn’t want to harm his long-term partner. He was hoping it was something that would just blow over.
The jury learned that Roger Cooper had spent at least a month plotting Sameena’s murder in order to stop her from exposing their two-year affair after she’d given him an ultimatum. He not only risked losing his relationship with his long-term partner, but also his position at Costco since relationships between managers were forbidden.
No one could understand why David, who ran a cafe in Loughborough & also worked as a doorman, would have agreed to help kill a woman he had only briefly met.
As the members of the jury unanimously found David & Roger Cooper guilty of murder, the brothers remained calm & didn’t look at each other. They were each sentenced to life in prison with the chance of parole after 30 years.
When the judge spoke of their crime he said, You killed a bright, selfless, ambitious, hard-working & life-loving woman – a daughter, a sister, an aunt – because that fact was inconvenient to you. You, Roger Cooper, took her to Leicester, to your brother’s house. Exactly what happened there you know, & no one else does. But I am satisfied that hardly had she entered the house that you two tall, strong men held her helpless while one of you administered chloroform, probably in a cloth to her face. It was a long-planned deliberate murder of a young woman whose misfortune it was to have fallen in love with you, Roger Cooper.
References:
- Wikipedia: Boxing Day
- Ati: 9 of the most horrific crimes committed on Christmas
- BBC News: Sameena Imam: Boss killed one of his three lovers, court hears
- BBC News: Cardiff woman’s body ‘contained poison,’ a court hears
- The Guardian: Sameena Imam trial: brothers found guilty of murdering cash-and-carry manager
- BBC News: Sameena Imam: Murder accused use ‘Star Wars code to communicate’
- Ilford Recorder: Sameena Imam murder: Brothers David & Roger Cooper found guilty of murder
- Vice: The secret relationship that ended in a Christmas murder
- Daily Mail: Thirty years jail each for ‘callous & calculating’ Costco boss who murdered one of his three lovers & this brother who helped him
- Mirror: Sameena Imam murder: Listen to chilling moment killer describes how he smothered Costco manager to death on sofa
- WalesOnline: Cold-blooded killers who murdered woman then buried her in shallow grave jailed for 30 years
- BBC News: Sameena Imam: ‘Murder victim’ died from chloroform
- The Guardian: Brothers jailed for 30 years for murder of colleague
- YouTube: Outlore with Eleanor Neale: Dead by Christmas morning: The brutal silencing of Sameena Imam
- BBC News: Murder accused said lover Sameena Imam was ‘sulking’
