Former Alexandria high school student pleads guilty to young couple s murder
By FOX 5 Digital Team
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Former TC Williams student pleads guilty to couple’s murder
A former T.C. Williams High School football player pleaded guilty to the murders of a young couple earlier this year.
HALIFAX COUNTY, Va. (FOX 5 DC) - A former T.C. Williams High School football player pleaded guilty Thursday to the murders of a couple found dead near the North Carolina border in rural Virginia earlier this year.
Virginia State Police say the bodies of Ayanna Griffin, 19, and Joel Bianda, 21, were discovered near a 2009 Silver Nissan Maxima following a car crash along Route 58 near Melon Road in Halifax County at around 2:51 a.m. on February 8, 2020.
19-year-old receives four life sentences for Halifax County double murder
Mohamed Aly killed Joel Bianda and Ayanna Griffin in February
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HALIFAX COUNTY, Va. – A 19-year-old will spend the rest of his life in prison after murdering two people in Halifax County earlier this year.
On Thursday, Mohamed Aly, who was 18 at the time of the crime, pleaded guilty to the first-degree murders of Joel Bianda, 21, and Ayanna Griffin, 18, as well as carjacking.
Ayanna Griffin, 18, and Joel Bianda, 21, were dating before being murdered by Mohamed Aly.
As part of the agreement, he received four consecutive life terms, as well as an additional 18 years for related firearms offenses.
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December 18, 2020
HALIFAX COUNTY, Va. -A teenager was sentenced to multiple life terms Thursday for two murders in Halifax County. Mohamed Aly pleaded guilty and received four life sentences plus 18 years for the shooting deaths of Joel Bianda and Ayanna Griffin on February 8, 2020.
Bianda had agreed to drive Aly from Alexandria to Danville. Griffin, Joel’s girlfriend, went along for the ride. Aly took a gun with him which he had picked up in Alexandria from a “marked location.”
Once they reached Halifax, Aly told Bianda to pull over. While Bianda was exiting the highway and while the car was still moving, Aly told investigators he “pointed the gun at his head, without thinking, without saying anything,” and pulled the trigger. A second later, he shot Griffin. He put the car in park in the median on Highway 58 near Melon Road, unfastened their seat belts and dumped their bodies in the median, then drove the car to Danville. Aly remembered he had left the firearm at the s
Aly told police he was having thoughts bad and good and said he was having doubts about college and his home life. Download our NBC Washington app for iOS or Android to get alerts for local breaking news and weather.
Early the morning of Feb. 8, Aly asked Bianda to pull over on Highway 58.
“I pointed the gun at his head,” Aly told police. “Without thinking, without saying anything, I pulled the trigger.”
Then he shot Maertens-Griffin, according to prosecutors.
He parked on the median and removed the victims’ bodies from the car, which he then drove to Danville where he picked up a juvenile friend, prosecutors said.