A Dearborn man tied to the trafficking of a woman later discovered dead along a rural Washtenaw County road has avoided prison and will serve probation instead.
Fareed George Hajjar, 58, was sentenced Tuesday to three years of probation after pleading guilty to facilitating travel for the purposes of prostitution. The conviction was part of a plea deal with the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office, which also requires Hajjar to complete sexual violence prevention training and bars him from strip clubs and other adult venues.
Hajjar declined to speak at sentencing. His attorney, Mark Kriger, told the court, “Mr. Hajjar certainly regrets the poor judgment he used in this case.”
Prosecutors said Hajjar picked up 42-year-old Suzan Ferreira, a Brazilian woman staying at a Novi hotel, and brought her to his Dearborn home for sex in exchange for money on June 22, 2024. Ferreira was never heard from again.
Her partially skeletonized remains were discovered on June 30, 2024 in Northfield Township off Earhart Road. A Washtenaw County medical examiner classified her manner of death as indeterminate after finding cocaine and alcohol in her system and a possible neck fracture.
Hajjar was not charged with murder, but he faced separate charges in Washtenaw County tied to how Ferreira’s body was handled. In March he pleaded guilty to disinterment and mutilation of a body and was sentenced to 150 hours of community service and two years of probation. A related charge of concealing a death was dismissed.
Family members blasted the punishment. “We still feel as though it was a light consequence for an extreme disturbance in our personal life,” Ferreira’s sister Renata Santana told MLive, adding that the family has been denied a proper grieving process.
Hajjar, who maintains he had nothing to do with Ferreira’s death, is now on probation in two separate cases that run until at least 2027.
