WOODBRIDGE, Va. -- When 16-year-old Jholie Moussa disappeared last January, police called her a runaway. Then her body was found two weeks later, a half mile from her Mount Vernon house.
On Monday, A grand jury indicted her ex-boyfriend in her murder.
Jholie’s mother and twin sister wish they knew a year ago that she was in deep trouble.
“You would’ve never known. He looks you in the eye when he speaks to you. He is manner-able," said Syreeta Steward.
Jholie’s ex boyfriend Nebiyu Ebrahim, 17 at the time, is charged with murdering her. Detectives say he confessed in a four-hour video taped interview in which he said he strangled her at Mount Vernon Park.
On that Friday afternoon, Jholie walked out the front door after she got a text from someone.
They now know the text came from the ex-boyfriend Ebrahim. Jholie met him at Woodlawn Park.
Detectives testified that Ebrahim said he and Jholie got into an argument and then he strangled her and killed her, then put her body in the woods.
Steward said they suspected him from the start.
"That was the first question we asked. Where is he? And he lied from the start and said he did not know where she was," Steward said.
They kept hoping he was telling the truth and that maybe she did leave town.
Steward believes Jholie was suffering from battered women's syndrome.
"Women tend to run back to their abusers for a multitude of reasons, but all of it has to do with manipulation...they feel like they're the reason he does what he does. I knew that it was an issue she kept on saying, like, 'I ruined his life because he can't come to school anymore.' She would say stuff like that. And we had multitude of conversations explaining to her that it wasn't her fault," said Steward.
Ebrahim was kicked out of Mount Vernon High School after he was charged with assaulting Jholie. He was ordered to stay away from her.
Now, the family knows he was not doing that.
"He was stalking her and he harassed her. It was a lot of phone calls from different phone numbers," said Zhane'.
They did not realize the emotional hold he had over her.
Mother and daughter now live in Texas where Zhane' has been part of a play about domestic violence. Her mom said she even helped a friend out of an abusive situation and may have saved her life.
"It’s absolutely wonderful because I feel like she didn’t go in vain. Her death wasn't, she just wasn’t another number," she said.
A date for the murder trial has not been set yet.
