A woman who once claimed she was too “good looking” to be arrested has been jailed for 15 years for murdering her mother in a fight over cigarettes.
Hend Bustami, 29, broke a glass table over her 61-year-old mother Afaf Hussanen’s head and then stabbed her with the broken shards of glass in a violent attack inside the home they shared in Las Vegas back in October 2022.
Following the attack, Bustami then called 911 and confessed to the dispatcher: “I think I killed my mommy.”
Officers responded to the scene to find Hussanen’s body inside the home, suffering from multiple stab wounds. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
The 29-year-old had fled before officers arrived but was tracked down by California Highway Patrol later that day near Barstow, California.
She was covered in blood and allegedly confessed to killing her mother after they got into a fight over cigarettes, court documents state.
Earlier this year, Bustami pleaded guilty but mentally ill to a charge of second-degree murder with the use of a deadly weapon.
On Tuesday, Clark County District Judge Jacqueline Bluth sentenced Bustami to 15 years to life in prison.
The brutal slaying came just four months after Bustami hit headlines for another brush with the law – where she claimed that she was too “good looking” and “pretty” to be arrested.
In June 2022, the then-28-year-old was arrested at the Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas for allegedly walking out on a bill at a restaurant on the concourse.
In a police report at the time, authorities said that Bustami left the Chili’s restaurant without paying.
Hend Bustami in Las Vegas mug shot— (LVMPD)
When officers responded to the scene, they found her being “belligerent” in the baggage claim area, according to a police report.
She then allegedly threatened to spit on the officers and claimed they were “trying to rape her because they had never seen anyone as good looking”.
She continued to brand the officers “perverts” and accused them of “harassing” her because she said they had “never seen anyone as pretty as her”.
Bustami was arrested at the scene for misconduct and booked into Clark County jail. At the time of that arrest, a warrant was also out for her arrest on a battery charge.
She had been due to appear in court on 27 October over the airport incident.
But just one day before the court appearance she was arrested for her mother’s murder.
Bustami is required to undergo treatment for mental illness as part of her sentence.
She will be eligible for parole in 2037.
