Good. Justice at last. I hope they rot in jail for long time.
British court convicts couple in daughter’s ‘honor’ murder
A British couple from Pakistan were convicted today of suffocating their teenage daughter, Shafilea, in a so-called “honor killing” for bringing shame on the family by becoming Westernized,
CAPTIONCheshire Police via PA/AP
the Daily Mail reports.
Iftikhar Ahmed, 52, and his wife, Farzana, 49, who were from the same Pakistani village, were sentenced to a minimum of 25 years in prison for suffocating their 17-year-old daughter, Shafilea, with a plastic bag nine years ago in their Warrington home.
The father showed no emotion at the sentencing in Chester, England, but his wife sobbed loudly.
“Your concern about being shamed in your community was greater than the love of your child,” said trial judge Roderick Evans, the Mail reports.
Three of their children were in the courtroom and burst into tears.
The conviction came just days after Farzana Ahmed changed her long-standing denials and testified this week that she had seen her husband attack their daughter on the night Shafilea died, CNN reports. Iftikhar Ahmed has denied killing his daughter.
The couple had clashed with Shafilea over her Westernized lifestyle, including wearing the same clothes as her non-Pakistani friends, rather than traditional Pakistani dress, and rejecting an arranged marriage, the Telegraph reports.
The couple had denied killing her, but police got a breakthrough in the case when another of their daughters, Alesha, was arrested for allegedly organizing a robbery at the home. Under questioning, she told police she had witnessed her parents killing Shafilea.
Here’s how the Telegraph describes her testimony in court:
She said her parents had held the terrified teenager down forcing a plastic bag into her mouth.
She told the jury: “You could tell she was gasping for air,” adding that Shafilea “wet herself because she was struggling so much”.
Asked what happened next, she told the court: “That was it, she was gone.”
CNN reports that Alesha testified that her parents were angry that Shafilea was wearing a short-sleeved, V-neck top, and no sweater, on the night she was killed.
“Just end it here,” Farzana said to Iftikhar, according to Alesha. She said the couple pushed Shafilea onto a sofa and pushed a plastic bag down her throat.
The Daily Mail reports that Alesha told the court the other children, shocked by the brutal killing, ran upstairs to their bedrooms while she witnessed her father carry Shafilea’s body to the car wrapped in a blanket. Alesha said the parents warned the other children they would meet a similar fate if they told anyone about the killing.
Shafilea’s decomposed remains were discovered in the River Kent in Cumbria in February 2004, the newspaper reports.
