The woman, who was found dead after having her throat cut, had previously reported her killer to police over alleged violence – she has been described as a ‘lovely lady’
A mum-of-two has died after her throat was allegedly cut in front of a hotel in Ireland – it has now emerged she had previously raised concerns about her suspected killer to the police.
She has been named as 31-year-old Masuma Sohrabi, an Iranian woman known in Galway as Atijafari. She was found dead with severe neck injuries outside an International Protection Accommodation Service centre in Co Galway after being reported missing on Wednesday (May 27).
The incident unfolded near Galway Road in Clifden on Thursday. Police, or Gardaí, were alerted to the scene by staff at the accommodation.
A man, also aged in his 30s, was arrested and is currently receiving medical treatment. Both are understood to be foreign nationals. An Garda Síochána is not looking for any other person in relation to this incident at this time and is following a definite line of enquiry.
The victim, who most friends knew simply as ‘Athija’, was mother to a five-year-old girl and nine-year-old boy – both of whom attended a local school in Clifden. She was working in a hotel in the area, locals say, and had come to this country from Tehran, where she fled the Iranian regime in the hopes of a better life.
PK Joyce, who runs the Waterloo House accommodation where she lived, paid an emotional tribute to her, telling the Irish Mirror how she had tried to learn English and Irish, and give her children better opportunities in life.
“I’d like you to pass the message on to people that she was a lovely lady. She was a great mother. She had come here for a new life and she really fit in extraordinarily well,” Mr Joyce said.
“She had very little English when she arrived but she strived to learn and a cúpla focal as Gaeilge as well. She really did want to try and fit in and make a home for her two children and she did that successfully up to yesterday.
“She was loved by us all and had a big impact on all our lives with what she had come through. We are just so saddened that she’s gone in the way that she has. We just want people to know that she was a lovely lady.”
She and her children had been living in the Clifden area for the past year, and she worked at a hotel in the town.
Her body is set to be removed from the site at which she died. She will be removed in due course, Gardaí said, and a post mortem examination will be carried out.
While it is understood a murder investigation is set to be launched, Gardaí have said the results of the post-mortem examination will assist in determining the course of the ongoing investigation.
