Picture of the Victim Eri Zefi

Man Sentenced 30 Years to Prison for Leading Friend to Ambush

Two years after a serious crime in Zall-Xhuxhë of Mirdita, where the young Eri Zefi was killed, the Lezha Prosecutor's Office requested Tuesday the sentence of 30 years in prison of the friend who ambushed him.

After the serious incident, the Police arrested 42-year-old Mikel (Gjovalin) Alia, who was charged with murder in collaboration. This citizen is accused that on October 2, 2019, he ambushed his childhood friend, Eri Zefi, to execute him.

The final conclusions were given by the prosecutor Erjon Shehaj, who has investigated the case and will now be the court that will decide on the fate of the 42-year-old.

Mikel (Gjovalin) Alia is the only person taken as a defendant for the murder of Eri Zefi, in ZallXhuxhë of Mirdita and he was discovered through messages, telephone tabs and film footage.

According to the investigative file, 42-year-old Alia had asked his childhood friend to help him steal a quantity of cannabis in the mountainous area of ​​Mirdita, where the crime took place.

The executors meanwhile are believed to have been two other persons, who to this day are still unidentified by the Police.

To reach them, the Lezha Prosecutor's Office asked the arrested Mikel (Gjovalin) Alia to cooperate with justice in exchange for facilities. But the 42-year-old has consistently denied any connection to the murder by pleading not guilty.

On his part, Eri Zefi was executed with 6 bullets, 4 of which hit him in the head, while the other 2 in the chest. The murder turns out to have happened during the night of October 1, 2019, exactly at the place where the body of the victim was found in a canal 50 meters away from the National Road.

The suspicions are that the young man was executed for revenge, as his brother was convicted of a murder in Durrës, but other conflicts of the 34-year-old himself have never been ruled out.

From the data of the telephone records that are part of the investigative file, it has resulted that the victim has constantly communicated with the citizen Mikel (Gjovalin) Alia. The file states that during this time the victim also communicated with his wife, Nazli Karagoz.

In her statements, she said that Eri Zefi wrote to her around 00:01 on October 2, 2019 on "WhatsApp": "I have a 10 percent battery man".

"I want to emphasize that the word 'baderi' my husband never used, but he used the word 'charisma' and I doubt that the last message may not have been written by him", said the wife.

Citizen Nazli Karagoz stated that on 01.10.2019, around 19:20, her husband, Eri Zefi, was at home and told her that he would meet two friends in Tirana, with whom he would go to FanëMirditë for robbed the narcotic plant cannabis sativa.

Meanwhile, she explained that she communicated several times with her husband through social media applications with video, where she saw that he was sitting in a bar in the neighborhood where they live, waiting to meet his friends and for the last time he communicated around 22:44, who told him: "I am leaving for Fana".

Furthermore, she explained that her husband was in enmity with the family of the citizen Martin Ndreca, who was killed by her brother-in-law.