On the evening of March 9, 2010, 32-year-old Hassan A. Abbas, a Sudanese man, was found bleeding on the floor of his Riverside, Missouri, apartment by his roommate. He was taken to a local hospital and pronounced dead from multiple gunshot wounds to the chest, face, and side. Spent .40 caliber shell casings and signs of a violent struggle were found at the scene.

Investigators focused on 19-year-old Cavona Flenoy of Kansas City, Kansas, who had recently met Abbas and had been with him at his apartment that night. Flenoy fled after the shooting with Abbas’s car, wallet, and cell phone and was located three days later still in possession of the stolen vehicle and wallet. She had attempted to use his credit card and had purchased the gun used in the shooting days earlier. During questioning she confessed, claiming Abbas attempted to sexually assault her and that she acted in self-defense; prosecutors characterized the killing as premeditated robbery.

In January 2011 Flenoy pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, armed criminal action, stealing a motor vehicle, and stealing a credit card and was sentenced to 25 years in prison with concurrent terms for the other counts. Her later appeals were denied.

Did anyone who knew Hassan or saw him in Riverside around March 9, 2010, ever notice anything out of the ordinary?