Husband gets prison for killing wife in Chatham Co. to escape arranged marriage
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- Omar Matthew Ibrahim Drabick pleaded guilty and received 25 to 31 years.
- Investigators found Hikmat shot in the back and her blood in his shoes and trunk.
- Drabick also got six to nine years for concealing a death with early-release conditions.
An Apex man pleaded guilty Monday in Chatham County to killing his wife and dumping her body in Jordan Lake to escape an arranged marriage in 2023.
Omar Matthew Ibrahim Drabick, 37, was sentenced to 25 to 31 years in prison for the second-degree murder of 34-year-old Hadeel Ghadhanfer Hikmat.
He was also sentenced to six to nine years for a second charge of concealing a death, with an option of leaving prison after three years if he avoids trouble and completes mental health and education requirements there, Superior Court Judge Allen Baddour said.
Drabick, who was a substitute teacher in Wake County Public Schools until June 2023, apologized when the judge asked if he wanted to say anything.
“From the bottom of my heart, I’m sorry,” Drabick said.
The couple married in 2022 after Drabick’s mother, who knew Hikmat’s family, arranged for her to travel to the United States from her home in Baghdad, Iraq.
The Turkish native had a degree in chemical engineering and got a job at Walmart in Wake County after her marriage. She also helped at the Drabick family’s dentist office.
She “was a very special person,” Assistant District Attorney Marci Trageser said. “She seemed full of life, and she certainly did not deserve a tragic ending.”
Drabick’s mother “thought she was doing what was best for everyone” in arranging a marriage, but Drabick was not happy and tried to get out of it by leaving the state and twice trying to join the military, Trageser and defense attorney James Rainsford said.
While the facts of the case indicate the court should prosecute it as first-degree murder, the court also has to take into account Drabick’s mental state, Trageser said.
“There is no one, I think, in this courtroom or even listening [that] could ever have predicted what would happen and why it would happen,” she said.
What led to Hadeel Hikmat’s death?
Search warrants and Chatham County Sheriff’s Office news releases reveal that Drabick picked his wife up from her job at Walmart around 11 p.m. on Aug. 28, 2023.
An anonymous witness who contacted investigators said Drabick told him that the couple had gone to Denny’s for dinner, and Hikmat had asked her husband to go to Strickland Park in Raleigh. They got there just after 2 a.m., when a man from Iraq showed up in a van, the person said.
Drabick told the person that the Iraqi man cursed at him in Arabic and told Hikmat she shouldn’t be with “the man with nothing,” the man told investigators. Drabick told him that Hikmat left the park with the Iraqi man, the person said.
He also told investigators that Drabick shared a “daydream” he’d had a few months earlier in which Hikmat had left him for “a rich man,” search warrants say. The marriage was rocky and was never consummated, the man said.
A boater found Hikmat’s body the next afternoon — Aug. 29, 2023 — near the Farrington Point Boat Ramp and called 911. Investigators confirmed Hikmat’s identity about a week later.
An autopsy showed she had been shot in the back and that drowning was not a factor in her death. Investigators also found two 9 mm casings on a nearby bridge, along with a large bloodstain and an earring that matched the pearl necklace Hikmat had been wearing.
The investigation revealed Drabick’s car was at a Refuel gas station near the lake around the same time, Trageser said.
He had also bought a Smith & Wesson 9 mm gun and box of ammunition from a Raleigh gun shop in 2022, she said, and on his cell phone, investigators found recent searches for ways to kill someone without getting caught and how to cover up a murder.
His wife’s blood was later found in Drabick’s shoes and the trunk of his car.
Why kill Hikmat instead of divorcing her?
The case has been one of the most difficult in her 30 years as an attorney, Trageser said.
Drabick was “a gentle, kind, hardworking” person, but “required structure,” Rainsford said. He worked hard to overcome learning issues and was diagnosed with autism. He studied at Wake Technical Community College and UNC-Greensboro, before getting an online degree, Rainsford said.
But Drabick lacked the maturity and social skills necessary to “escape something that he found overwhelming,” and fell into depression, Rainsford said.
Hikmat’s brother Firas Hekmat, who lives in his family’s native Turkey, appeared on a courtroom video screen Monday to make a brief statement and ask Drabick why he killed Hikmat, instead of divorcing her.
“You killed our sister, and without [us] saying goodbye,” Firas Hekmat said. “There’s no final scene, just disappearance. She disappeared from this world and left us with a tragic moment.”
It’s a fair question, but there may not be an answer, Baddour said.
He also acknowledged the Drabick family’s loss.
Drabick’s father and sister were in the courtroom for the hearing. His mother, who Trageser said thought of Hikmat as “another daughter,” left as the trial started.
Drabick’s mother does not bear any responsibility for Hikmat’s death, Baddour said.
“I don’t see that anyone goes into [arranged marriages] thinking of this as a result,” he said. “So while I can appreciate the feeling of responsibility, I don’t think it’s a burden that you should bear.”
This story was originally published May 18, 2026 at 1:42 PM with the headline "Husband gets prison for killing wife in Chatham Co. to escape arranged marriage."
CORRECTION: James Rainsford was the defense attorney for Omar Drabick, not William Massengale as previously reported.
