The prosecutor in the infamous Sara Sharif murder case has revealed that the 10-year-old girl started wearing hijab to conceal injuries on her head and face.
The revelation came during the proceedings on the second day of the trial against Sara’s father and two others at London’s Old Bailey court.
The girl child was found dead in August 2023 at her home in Woking, a town southwest of London, after what prosecutors say was a campaign of “serious and repeated violence”.
As per a report published by BBC, the post-mortem examination found the victim had suffered dozens of injuries including “probable human bite marks”, an iron burn and scalding from hot water.
Her father Urfan Sharif, 42, his wife and Sara Sharif’s stepmother Beinash Batool, 30, and the girl’s uncle Faisal Malik, 29, are on trial at London’s Old Bailey court charged with her murder.
The trio are alternatively charged with causing or allowing the death of a child. All three deny the charges against them and blame each other for her death, prosecutors say.
Prosecutor Bill Emlyn Jones, on the second day of the trial, told the jurors that Sara began wearing a hijab to hide her facial injuries in January 2023, months before her body was discovered at her home in Woking, Surrey, BBC reported.
As per the prosecutor, the head covering was “indicative of the need to conceal injuries to her face and head from the outside world”.
He said that Sara’s injuries were noticed in her school at two instances, first in June 2022 and later in March 2023.
When asked, she told different “conflicting tales of how she got the injuries and used her headscarf to hide her face when questioned by teachers”, Jones stated.
Later in April 2023, Sara was withdrawn to be home-schooled, he added.
The prosecutor also cited the accounts from the slain girl’s neighbours of hearing “shockingly loud” sounds of hitting accompanied by screams and cries of the young girl child.
Sara’s father Urfan has recently confessed to beating the 10-year-old to death
Prosecutor Jones on the first day of the trial had told jurors that Urfan told police: “I beat her up. It wasn’t my intention to kill her, but I beat her up too much.”
The prosecutor said a note in Urfan’s handwriting was also found next to his daughter’s body, which read: “I swear to God that my intention was not to kill her. But I lost it.”
Jones told the jury that each of Urfan, Batool and Malik “played their part in the violence and mistreatment which resulted in Sara’s death”.
The three defendants all deny responsibility for any of violence and abuse and each “seeks to deflect the blame onto one or both of the others”, Jones said.
Urfan blames his wife Batool, Emlyn Jones said, and his apparent confessions to the police were designed to “protect the true guilty party”.
The prosecutor added that Batool’s case is that Urfan Sharif was a “violent disciplinarian” and that she was scared of him, while Malik says he was unaware of any abuse or violence.
The trial is expected to run until December.
