Muscat: The Royal Oman Police (ROP) have arrested a Filipina gym instructor on charges of killing her compatriot last week.
The 51-year-old victim, Maria Lourdes, was also a gym instructor at PDO’s (Petroleum Development Oman) health club. She was found dead in her apartment in Qurum suburb last week.
The mother of four from General Santos City in Philippines was found in a pool of blood.
Her employers informed police after she was absent from work for a few days and her mobile phone appeared to be switched off.
Officers from the Wattayeh Police Station broke open her apartment and found slightly decomposed body in a pool of blood.
Police investigations led to a last call made on the murdered woman’s mobile phone.
The last call was made by her compatriot and former colleague at a privately owned gym, Allain Reyes, whom police took into custody for investigations.
Under sustained police interrogation, Reyes, who is also mother of two small children, confessed to her crime on Tuesday and the police pressed formal charges of murder against her.
“It is a shock to all of us,” a colleague of the two at a private gym told Gulf News. She said that both the women were good natured and good friends since the time they worked at the same gym as fitness instructors.
“A few months ago, Maria left the gym where Allain was working and joined another company that had contract to give fitness lessons at the PDO gym,” she added.
According to police sources, the two Filipina had arguments and a dispute arose from that while they were at the murdered woman’s flat.
“In a fit of rage the accused stabbed her friend to death with a kitchen knife,” a source at the Wattayeh Police Station confirmed.
