|
Main Menu
Login
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Father of Rape Victim Shahed
|
demands the harshest punishments for the man who raped his daughter
By: Malek Abo khair- Al Thara
Translated by: Elly Teitsworth
4-9-2010
It is difficult to describe what happens to a raped child. No matter how we try to choose our words, we cannot express it; the tragedy is greater than anything that can be summarized in words. What happened to Shahad is difficult for us to forget—so how can she, a four-year-old girl, forget what happened? How can her innocent memory recover after all of this cruelty and brutality?
A girl of no more than four years of age was kidnapped, raped, and beaten in an act of violence that surpassed the brutality we hear about on the news or in movies. Then she was thrown on the ground like a used rag, her blood seeping around her, because the man who did this was outside of his own control. He was under the influence of substances which have affected the minds of our youth to the point where they believe that the drug that provides an escape from life is more important than sustenance itself. Perhaps for someone who has lost all of the morals and principals that we have come to call “human values,” Shahad’s smile and innocent childhood play were not enough to deter him from assaulting her and assaulting her childhood. We have reached an era in which everything happens—particularly acts committed by those who allow themselves to transgress the rules of nature and society.
This story has begun but it will never finish, despite that the criminal is now in the hands of the law. The girl who suffered the assault is only a child. Even now she does not understand what happened to her, or why she bled so much from a part of her body that she still does not know what it is named or what it is for. A crime like this will never come to an end and will not be forgotten, because its victim grows older each day, and with the passing of days her suffering deepens as she comes to understand what happened to her. Al-Thara met with Shahad’s family, which is still reliving what happened and trying to move past the incident without giving up their rights or neglecting the rights of their daughter, Shahad.
Shahad’s father, Mr. Kafaah Naayif Al-Muusaa, emphasized in his conversation with us that he is still in a state of shock. His mind has not yet cleared and he cannot know when he will awake to reality. The incident happened in the blink of an eye— no more than an hour and a half passed between losing Shahad and finding her again. He described the details for us: “At about 11 pm I was sitting in front of a friend’s house, near my home, in the Palestinian refugee camp in the city of Dar’aa. Shahad was beside me. After about 15 minutes I called for her to go home. We lived no more than 25 meters from where we were sitting. This was considered normal in the camp—the residents of this camp in particular tend to stay out late at night, especially during Ramadan. After a little time passed, one of my children came and asked about Shahad, which worried me. I hurried to look for her but I didn’t find her anywhere she was likely to be. I even looked in most of the houses in the camp as people came out of their homes to help us look for her. We continued searching until a young man, who lived next to the school where the assault took place, brought her to us. She was in a terrible state, with blood covering her clothes almost completely.”
The suspicion and accusation of four young men:
Regarding the arrest of the four young men who were accused of the crime in the beginning, Mr. Kafaah says: “When we learned that Shahad was found in the school we went there right away. When we arrived we found a young man with a motorcycle nearby, in a dark corner of the school. When we asked him why he was there, he told us that he was waiting for a group of friends with whom he had agreed to meet. This aroused our suspicion, especially once we found out that the people whom he was waiting for were not from the camp. We arrested him immediately and turned him over to the police, who began an investigation of the man and his three friends. We don’t deny that in the beginning we thought that they were the ones who committed this hideous act.”
Identifying and arresting the perpetrator:
Shahad’s uncle, Mr. ‘Amr Naayif Muusaa, works for the criminal security department in Dar’aa and was beside his brother from the moment Shahad was lost until the time the perpetrator was arrested. He was the one who identified and arrested him, so he spoke with us about the details of finding the perpetrator. He told us: “The morning following the incident I went to the site of the crime, hoping to find any evidence leading to the criminal who carried out this hideous act—especially because our suspicions had begun to shift away from the man we arrested on the night of the crime. By chance I found a piece of cookie in a corner next to several drops of red blood. This made me suspicious, so I headed to the only shop in the camp where this product was sold and asked if anyone had bought that brand of cookies the previous evening. The owner confirmed to me that a young man had arrived holding a young girl’s hand, and that he had purchased these cookies and then headed towards the road to the school. In the course of the investigation, the owner of the shop recognized the girl and provided an exact description that led us to the identity of the perpetrator, who was working at the time at a paint shop near the camp. The police burst into his home and arrested him.
During his interrogation the criminal confessed the full details of his crime. His confession, which he provided to the Dar’aa police, confirmed that he was sitting in a dark corridor while Shahad crossed the alley leading to her house. He said he was waiting for any “boy or girl” to assault, and Shahad was the first to show up; all he had to do was lure her under the pretext of buying cookies for her from a nearby store. Then he held her hand, and taking advantage of the fact that she was busy eating sweets, he headed quickly to a school—the schools are all deserted now because the school year has not yet begun. First he threw her over the wall of the school and into the courtyard, which inflicted her with several bruises. Then he headed to a corner of the courtyard and began beating her violently, covering her mouth with his hand, and dragged her to a dark area in the courtyard where he brutally assaulted her. Her clothes were soaked in blood that streamed from her body.”
He finished by adding, “The distressing part is that after raping the girl the perpetrator intended to leave her in the courtyard, believing her to be dead because was she was bleeding so profusely. He returned to the neighborhood, and when he noticed our distress, he asked what was wrong. He convinced us that, as a resident of the camp, he was deeply concerned for her, and he helped us search for Shahad until she was found. He even tried to beat the young man whom we found near the school and who was originally accused of committed the crime.”
Shahad… and her deteriorating health and psychological condition:
Shahad’s pregnant mother could not bear to see her daughter’s condition of suffering, and when she saw the blood that covered her daughter she immediately began to hemorrhage. The mother was taken to the hospital for treatment, and so her aunt, Mrs. Nawaal Naayif Muusaa, took over and looked after her health conditions. When we spoke with Mrs. Muusaa, she said, “When we brought her to the hospital she was suffering from a high fever, shaking, and extreme fear. After the event she suffered from severe hemorrhaging from her genitals, as well as bruises in the region of her back, hands, and mouth, where he had strangled and beaten her during the rape. There were clear marks of his fingers on her mouth, and as I said, the beating of her hands, feet, and back and her loss of blood were severe.”
The children’s ward would not accept Shahad because they found a serious wound in her uterus upon examing her. Because of the wounds in her vagina that had caused her uterus to hemorrhage, they transferred her to the maternity ward. Unfortunately, in the beginning her treatment was carried out by a group of resident doctors and nurses who stitched her wounds incorrectly, and the mistake was not discovered until the arrival of the doctor who was overseeing her treatment. The governor then interfered and ordered that she enter a private ward of the province’s national hospital, where the stitches were undone and the stitching process was performed again. She will remain in continuous treatment for five years because she has undergone internal and external stitching of her uterus.
Regarding Shahad’s psychological condition, Mrs. Nawaal said, “All that she’s seen from the moment of the crime until today is the color of blood—from the time she entered the hospital until she left, and even after she returned home. When she washed her face, she imagined that the water was blood streaming from her face. The water had become that red color that doesn’t leave her thoughts or her dreams. She was suffering from severe nausea when she heard the word “blood.”
Legally, the final decision regarding the case rests with the courts. But from the perspective of Shahad’s family, and according to their lawyer, Baasim Khudar—who was one of a large number of lawyers in Dar’aa who volunteered to take on the case—execution is the only decision that will realize justice.
Mr. Khudar said, “The defendant’s guilt is clear without a doubt, as he has confessed to the crime in front of the police and the investigation judge. All the statutes of the law condemn his acts completely, not to mention that according to his confession he had not targeted Shahad specifically but was waiting for any child to show up, and that he committed the crime in the middle of the night by luring her far from the neighborhood and throwing her inside a deserted courtyard—all of which demonstrate premeditated intent to carry out the crime. He violated the sanctity of the school grounds, and after beating her violently, he considered her to be dead. He left cold-bloodedly as she lay in her blood on the ground wrestling with death. According to his thinking, this would be easy because the girl was very young and still a minor, so she would not recognize him even if they put him directly in front of her after the crime. He said this ‘put his mind at ease.’ I will add that during his police report he confirmed that he had not broken her hymen with his penis but with his hand, as well as a number of other facts that are too hideous to mention in the press. I find that execution is the only solution when dealing with criminals like this—not a prison sentence of ten or fifteen years before he would be released. During that time Shahad will have become a young woman approaching marriage, only to see the man who destroyed her life and every day of her childhood show up once again.”
The perpetrator’s family demands his execution
The parents, siblings, and most of the relatives of the perpetrator presented a petition to the public lawyer of Dar’aa, using the criminal identification initials of the perpetrator before their son’s name. They signed the petition demanding that the lawyer aim to sentence him to execution. This appeared in the petition as follows: “Our son, “defendant M. M,” has committed the crime of raping a girl of only four years of age, and the punishment for this crime is execution. In view of the gravity of his crime, we have come to you pleading and petitioning for an execution sentence against our son. God allow us to continue supporting you as you carry out justice, and we will accept your decision with respect.”
Reactions did not stop there. The streets were boiling with anger when the people heard about the crime and learned who the perpetrator was and what he had done. This led many residents living in the camp to attack the perpetrator’s home and twice set it on fire, as well as setting fire to his family’s home. The matter might have developed further if Shahad’s uncles and relatives had not intervened and prohibited anyone from directing any harm towards the perpetrator’s relatives, as they are not the ones who carry the responsibility for his actions.
When the perpetrator arrived at the schoolyard, more than 2,000 people gathered near the site of the crime. Camp residents informed us that they tried to take him from the hands of the police, and may have killed him if it were not for the reinforcement unit that interfered and was able to pull him out of the mob.
The end… or a required conclusion
During the meeting between Shahad’s family and the governor of Dar’aa, the governor confirmed to them that this incident was not the first during his time in the province. By the most conservative estimate it was the fifth. As for the fate of those who carry out these crimes, they are given prison sentences of ten to fifteen years at most.
But now the question is: will silence, or even typical punishments, change the behavior of those who do not fear God and who disrespect and distain the most basic of moral values and principles? Is it possible to consider prison—even if for long period of time—to be sufficient punishment for him, and a sufficient warning to those who may follow in his path? Or should he be executed by hanging in a public square before everyone, because those who commit acts outside of reason deserve such kinds of punishment?
In the end, we must wait to find out what the court rules. Everyone we met with hopes that it will be the harsh and severe punishment that is deserved by someone who violates the most beautiful moments of childhood, and tramples them under his feet.
Thara E- Magazine No. 249,4/9/2010
Reproduction permitted with appropriate citation |
|
 
The comments are owned by the poster. We aren't responsible for their content.
|
|
|
Site Search
Web Search
Archives
|
 |
