THE SHAFIA HONOR MURDERS   (part 3)                                             

As I mentioned in Part 1 and 2 of this three-part series, this is a very long article for you to read in these two parts but as you read it, you will be fascinated at how and why three members of a family, murdered four of their own family members. I got the information from a past edition of Mcleans Magazine that had written a very large article about the murders. I have written my own version of the events with the Maclean`s article and other sources as a guide.

A description of the four bodies

The police diver who swam to the bottom of the canal found Zainab Shafia in the front passenger seat, her face slumped forward, her fingernails painted a light shade of blue. She was 19 years old and had 10 cents in her pocket. Her black cardigan, drenched after hours underwater, was on backwards.

Sahar, her younger sister, was in the rear of the sunken Nissan Sentra, dressed in a pair of tight jeans and a sleeveless top. Her belly button was pierced (a stud with twin stones) and her nails were polished two different colours: purple on the fingers, black on the toes. As always, the stylish 17-year-old was within reach of her cellphone—which was about to become a crucial clue for the investigators above.

Geeti’s lifeless body was floating over the driver’s seat, one arm wrapped around the headrest, the window beside her wide open. Like Sahar—the big sister she idolized—Geeti had a navel ring underneath her brown shirt. Detectives would later find a note she had scribbled to Sahar, full of hearts and red ink: “i WiSH 2 GOD DAT TiLL iM ALIVE I’LL NEVER SEE U SAD!” She was 13. I don’t know who she was referring to.

Rona Amir Mohammad was slouched in the middle back seat, her soaked black hair rubbing against Sahar’s. At 52, she was the eldest of the dead: the girls’ supposed “auntie,” but in fact their dad’s first wife in the secretly polygamous Afghan clan. The day she drowned, Rona put on a blue shirt, three pairs of earrings, and six gold bangles.

None of the four victims were seat belted in the car which is proof that the car wasn’t driven into the canal but actually pushed into the canal. The fact that none of the victims were behind the steering wheel added to the stupid blunder on the part of their three killers. 

This means that the three killers—Mohammad Shafia, the girls’ father, Tooba Mohammad Yahya, the girls’ mother, and Hamed Shafia, the girls’ 18-year-old brother would soon face the music.       

Shafia’s and Tooba’s daughters died because they were defiant and beautiful and had dreams of their own. Because they were considered property, not people. But the two words at the heart of this sensational case—“honour killing”—do not tell the whole twisted tale. What happened on that pitch-black night is also a story about cries for help that were missed or ignored by the authorities that were careless in their jobs.  

Sahar’s white body bag was the first on the autopsy table. Dr. Christopher Milroy had been briefed on the basics (Niagara Falls, submerged car, open window) and as he examined the young corpse in front of him, he filled his clipboard with meticulous notes. “The memories stick in her pocket. The belly button ring. The potatoes in her stomach, most certainly french fries from that Ajax McDonald’s. Sahar was “a well-nourished and well developed female,” he concluded. “There were no fresh injuries.”

Rona, like all of them, had “washerwoman hands,” wrinkled like prunes after so long in the water. Her eyes were brown, her hair was black, and her heart was the heaviest of the four. On page eight of his report, Milroy noted-oblivious to the full significance-that Rona was “non-pregnant.”

It wasn’t until Dr. Milroy peeled back the skin on her skull that he discovered the red and black bruises. Both were on the crown of Rona’s head, covering six centimetres in diameter. “It is a very substantial area of bruising,” he said. “It could occur in one impact or it could be the result of two impacts.”

Geeti, who was third on the table, had nearly identical bruises on her head, although smaller. So did Zainab. “It is unusual that all three would have similar injuries,” the pathologist later testified in court. “It clearly requires an explanation.”

That explanation would never come. Science could confirm only three things for sure: the head injuries occurred while the victims were still alive. (the dead can’t be bruised) The official cause of death was drowning, and there were no drugs or other paralyzing substances found in the women’s blood. Were they knocked unconscious before the water filled their lungs? Did they actually drown in the canal, or somewhere else beforehand? Were they dead or alive when the Nissan sank? As Milroy put it, “the pathology is neutral.”

But outside the autopsy room, investigators were literally piecing together other important clues.

The children could have lived if it wasn’t for the stupidity of the various authorities who were aware of the abuses the children endured at the hands of their father, their mother and their brother.  I will explain why.

Zainab “ran away” on Friday, April 17, 2009, taking refuge at a women’s shelter. For Shafia, it was a monstrous betrayal. His adult daughter was out in the world, unsupervised, unrestrained. She could be having sex. And even if she wasn’t, people would think that, which is just as bad.

Her courage, her thirst for freedom, is what got her killed just ten weeks later. She was considered a bad apple by her three murderers. But what began as a conspiracy to punish her, and only her, quickly spiralled into mass murder. One bad apple became two bad apples. Two became three. And three became four.

The trial of the three killers

The evidence, utterly heartbreaking, left no real doubt about what really happened to those most unfortunate victims.  Before they died, the Shafia sisters and Shafia’s first wife were caught in the ultimate culture clash, living in Canada but not allowed to be treated as Canadians. The girls were expected to behave like good Muslim daughters, to wear the hijab and marry a fellow Afghan, and not to rebel against their father’s traditions.  

After four months their trial, 58 witnesses, and too many lies to count, a jury found Shafia, Tooba and their beloved Hamed guilty of quadruple murder in the first degree. It took just 15 hours of deliberation for the jurors to reach their verdict.

The jury had no sympathy for these three murders. Capital punishment was abolished in Canada years ago so a different punishment loomed for these three monsters.  It was life in prison. Now since they committed the crimes after the law that awarded multiple murders committed by murderers to consecutive sentences, they were instead sentenced to four life sentences to be served to a single sentence of 25 years before they can apply for parole. There is still a chance that they won’t be released by the time they reach the 25-year term. When they are eligible to apply for parole, an application may be made by the Crown to a court to extend their imprisonment indefinitely as dangerous offenders.   

                                                           

Ontario’s appellate court dismissed the appeals by Mohammad Shafia, his wife Tooba Yahya and their son Hamed Shafia,

The evidence was so damming, there could be no legitimate grounds to appeal. Further, jury decisions cannot be appealed in Canada.

Lawyers for the convicted trio had argued that their original trial was "tainted by cultural prejudice" by invoking the concept of “honour killing.” The trio’s  lawyers argued that an expert witness called to testify in their original trial, University of Toronto professor Shahrzad Mojab, provided “highly prejudicial” testimony concerning the so-called practice of parents “honour killing” offspring who had shamed them

That is utter nonsense. Those stupid lawyers would probably give the same argument if they were appealing on behalf of sex offenders by saying that the Crown compared their sex crimes committed by their clients were no different than mass sex attacks done in other locales.

The Crown argued that there was “overwhelming” evidence of guilt presented at the original trial and the verdict would have been guilty even if the expert testimony on honour killings was excluded.

The original trial also contained testimony from teachers, child protection workers and police who recounted reports from the slain Shafia siblings that they feared for their safety and wanted to leave the family's home in Montreal.

Wiretapped conversations played at the original trial heard Mohammed say that his daughters' behaviour tarnished him and his family's honour.

Mr. Justice Watt writing for the other two appeal judges, also seemed to agree with the Crown’s statement that there was a vast amount of evidence in this case, enough to convict all three defendants of first degree murder on all three counts.

Their lawyers also argued that the original trial judge provided improper instructions to the jury and that Hamed Shafia should not have been tried in an adult court alongside his parents.

That argument is unadulterated gibberish. If he was treated as a young offender, he would be released from prison in ten years. After he turned eighteen, (before he committed the murders) he  was automatically treated as an adult and as an adult, he was subjected to the same punishment as his parents were. 

I am sure that they are in separate federal prisons—two for men and one for women. I also believe that they are treated with utter contempt by the inmates of those prisons—and rightly deserved.

As I see it, these three evil persons are psychopaths. That is because they have no feelings for people in general other that indifference or hatred. Unfortunately, there are millions of these human freaks around the world. It doesn’t take long for anyone with a brain to recognize them. Unfortunately the social workers and teachers dealing with this particular family missed the signs of a dysfunctional family led by three of the members who were psychopaths.