Shafia trial comes to an end with guilty verdict

By Katrina Geenevasen

Following 15-hours of deliberation, the jury in the Shafia murder trial told the packed courtroom it found all three defendants guilty of murder in the first degree.

Mohammad Shafia, 58, his wife Tooba Yahya, 42, and their eldest son, 21-year-old Hamed were each found guilty on four counts of first-degree murder in what the crown said was an honour killing.

They will now serve life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years.

Zainab, Sahar and Geeti Shafia, along with Mohammad’s first wife Rona Amir, were found drowned in the Kingston Mills locks in June 2009.

The verdict was announced just after 1 p.m. on Sunday in Kingston.

Jurors in the case sifted through the testimonies of over 50 witnesses and analyzing 165 exhibits.

As the jurors entered the room, Tooba appeared to be praying silently to herself, while Mohammad looked at people filling the courtroom.

After the foreman read the verdict, Tooba and Hamed began to cry. Mohammad comforted his son by first rubbing his back and then his head.

Several sighs of relief were heard in the spectators’ gallery.

Shafia, while comforting his son, said, “Your honour, we are not criminals. We are not murderers. We didn’t commit the murder. This is unjust.”

Tooba had a similar reaction, telling the judge, “I’m not a murderer. I am a mother.”

And Hamed, while crying, said, “Sir, I did not drown my sisters anywhere.”

Justice Robert Maranger, who presided over the trial, spoke to the convicted murderers moments after the verdict was read.

“The apparent reason behind these cold-blooded shameful murders was that the four completely innocent victims offended your twisted notion of honour,” he said.

Maranger also said the Shafia’s had a “sick notion of honour that has absolutely no place in any civilized society.”

It’s a trial that has generated both local and national attention since it began in October last year.

During closing arguments, people lined up in the cold; some sleeping in their cars overnight to get a coveted seat in the spectators’ gallery.

The Crown argued it was a planned and deliberate murder; that each of the convicted had a motive and developed a plan to mask the murders as an accident.

They argued four girls lost their lives because of an angry father, a controlling brother, and a mother who didn’t do what every mother should do – protect her children.

Crown prosecutor Laurie Lacelle said the three sisters and Rona had each expressed a desire to leave the family and were behaving badly, so they were killed to protect family honour.

Zainab, 19, married against her parents will and not long after had the marriage annulled.

“When Zainab left the Shafia household, that was when the down spiral commenced,” said Lacelle. “It was a plan that grew to include three other girls.”

Sahar, 17, also had an unapproved boyfriend.

“This meant she, too, was a whore,” said Lacelle.

“The actions of Zainab and Sahar were intolerable. They violated the cardinal sin of being in the arms of boys. This is why Shafia [Mohammad] said they deserved to die.”

Geeti, 13, was skipping school, dressing inappropriately and had gotten caught shoplifting.

“Geeti was uncontrollable,” said Lacelle. “She was only 13 when she died, but she had an independent spirit, and she wasn’t going to do what was asked of her.”

“Geeti had established herself among her siblings as the true rebel, and she made it clear she would not be controlled.”

Fifty-two-year-old Rona Amir, Mohammad’s first wife in a polygamous marriage, had made repeated requests for a divorce.

“Rona was utterly disposable,” said Lacelle. “She wasn’t wanted, was no longer needed.”

Lacelle said Mohammad, Tooba and Hamed were eager to be rid of their misbehaving family members.

“Shafia, Tooba and Hamed had decided there was a diseased limb on their family tree,” said Lacelle. “And their solution was to trim that tree back to good wood.”

Lacelle also pointed out the threesome were the last to see the girls before their deaths.

“Mohammad, Tooba and Hamed were, on all accounts, the last to see them alive, and the only people in the world who wanted them dead,” said Lacelle. “No one else had the exclusive opportunity to kill them, no one else thought they deserved to die. What happened to Zainab, Sahar, Geeti and Rona was no mistake. It was murder.”

Meanwhile, defense lawyers Peter Kemp, David Crowe, and Patrick McCann said it was an accident; the result of a late night joyride that went horribly wrong.

They speculated Zainab, an unlicensed driver, had taken the keys to her parents Nissan Sentra without their permission, gotten lost, and drove into the canal by accident.

They argued Hamed, who was forensically proven to be at the scene of the murder, had followed his sisters to the Kingston Mills locks to make sure they were okay. When he accidentally rear-ended the Nissan, the taillight of the Lexus was broken.

Defense claimed that as Hamed was picking up the pieces of the broken headlight, he heard a splash only to discover the car carrying his three sisters and Rona had fallen into the locks.

Grabbing a rope from the back of the family’s Lexus, Hamed dangled it below, waiting for someone to swim to the surface and grab the rope.

When none of them did, Hamed got into his car, drove to Montreal, and left the four women in their watery grave.

Hamed didn’t call for help, and didn’t call his parents to tell them what happened.

When he got to Montreal, Hamed staged a single-car accident in an empty parking lot to disguise the broken taillight.

He said he did it because he didn’t want his parents to blame him for his sisters and Rona’s deaths.

But their accident theory just wasn’t strong enough to get the three acquitted.

Throughout the trial, countless pieces of evidence suggested the guilt of Mohammad, Tooba and Hamed.

Days before the murders took place, someone was on the family computer researching tips on murder.

There were Google searches done in English on “where to commit a murder”, “documentaries on murder”, and “facts and commentaries on murder.”

There was speculation it was Hamed using the computer for these alarming searches.

Police also found someone had been researching whether or not a prisoner could control their real estate from prison.

But that’s not all.

Constable Glenn Newell, the police diver who recovered the four bodies from the car, said the girls were piled on top of each other, and that it was hard to determine who was the driver.

He also said the driver’s side window was completely down, but it appeared none of the victims tried to escape through that open window.

Each seat was reclined, and nobody in the car was wearing a seatbelt.

While three of the four victims had identical bruises on top of their heads, none of them showed any other signs of a struggle.

There were no cuts or scrapes on the girls or on Rona, nor did it look like their wrists had been bound.

Toxicology tests showed none of the victims had been drugged, but the cause of death was determined to be drowning. It was never determined when or how the victims were drowned.

Police and technical experts also said the Nissan had to travel through such tight spots in order to get into the canal that it seemed to be a deliberate, planned route.

The wiretap evidence secretly recorded by police further suggested guilt.

Mohammad was heard calling his dead daughters “treacherous” and “whores”.

“God’s curse on them…May the devil shit on their graves,” said Shafia during one of the conversations. He said if his daughters came back to life, he would cut them in pieces with a cleaver.

Jurors also heard from teachers, child protection workers and police about reports the girls were afraid of their father and brother; that they were emotionally and physically abused.

Crown argued the Nissan, a cheaper alternative to the expensive Lexus, was purchased just days before the family’s so-called “vacation”.

“The Nissan was being used that night to dispose of the bodies,” said Lacelle.

In the last few years, honour killings have began to make their way into Canada, becoming more and more prevalent.

During the trial, Lacelle explained in some cases, family honour could be tarnished by sexual misconduct or disobedience of women. In some cases, families believe they can restore their honour by killing the women who have transgressed.

In some parts of the world, women who have been raped have also been murdered for the dishonour of being a victim and the disgrace it brings to their family.

A study by the University of Sherbrooke shows there have been 12 honour-killing victims in Canada since 1999 compared with three between 1954 and 1983.