Teenager ‘suffocated by parents as sister watched’

Alesha Ahmed, now 23, said she watched her parents “acting together” during the murder of her 17 year-old older sister, Shafilea, in September 2003, Chester Crown Court was told.

Iftikhar, 52, and Farzana Ahmed, 49, deny killing their Bradford-born daughter Shafilea, whose decomposed remains were found near a flooded river in Cumbria five months later in February 2004.

The murder was allegedly witnessed by Shafilea’s younger sister Alesha, who kept the secret for seven years.

Prosecutor Andrew Edis QC told the court: “She (Alesha) describes what is an act of suffocation by both her parents acting together.”

He said they put their hands over her face “to close her airways so she could not breathe”. He added: “She had a bag forced into her mouth.”

The court was told that Ms Ahmed saw her father with a large object wrapped in binbags and brown tape – which she assumed was Shafilea – and which he drove off with in a car.

The couple allegedly murdered their “westernised” teenage daughter because they believed her conduct was bringing shame on the family.

Mr Edis told the jury that Alesha was arrested in 2010 for being involved in a robbery at her parents’ home, in which three masked men tied up her mother, two sisters and brother.

Six days later she told police that her parents killed Shafilea, he said.

Mr Edis told the jury that Alesha was either telling the truth about the death of her sister “which she has kept under wraps for years for reasons of family loyalty”, or for other reasons because her relationship with her parents “became toxic”.

“Her life has turned upside down because of what she has said and what she has done.”

He described her disclosure as a “bombshell” and said it was either the truth or “a wicked lie made up to help herself”.

Ms Ahmed, who is on witness protection and gave evidence from behind a curtain, told the court they grew up in a “restrictive” Pakistani culture, and that western culture was “more free”.

The jury was told this forced Shafilea to live “a secret life” that her parents did not know about.

She said: “I think she found it difficult which is why it emerged she was living a life my parents didn’t know about. It was kind of a secret life as well.”

Asked what would happen when Shafilea came into conflict with her parents, Alesha said: “She was physically abused.”

The court was told this happened “virtually every day”.

She said the violence was triggered by the friends she kept, who were white girls, her music and her non-traditional clothes.

Ms Ahmed said her parents also “had their suspicions” that she was in contact with boys.

In one incident she described how her parents threatened Shafilea with a knife, and on another occasion how her sister was left in a room without food for several days.

Ms Ahmed also spoke about a family trip to Pakistan in February 2003 and said she believed it was her parents’ intention to keep Shafilea there, but the children were told the trip was to attend “family weddings”.

Once in Pakistan she said Shafilea was worried about not being able to go back home.

The trial continues.