Father, son charged with double murder in latest ‘honour crime’

AMMAN — The Criminal Court prosecutor on Sunday charged a man and his son with premeditated murder over the deaths of their married female relative and a man in Amman, officials said.

The female victim, aged 22, and a 19-year-old man were both stabbed to death near an apartment building in Jubeiha neighbourhood at around 1am on Sunday, a senior judicial source said.

The female victim’s brother, a 20-year-old, turned himself in to police claiming to have killed the pair “to cleanse his family’s honour”, the judicial source told The Jordan Times.

However, further investigation by the authorities indicated that the 55-year-old father of the suspect “was also complicit in the double murder”, according to the judicial source.

In his initial testimony to police and Criminal Court Prosecutor Mohammad Bdairat, the young suspect said he decided to murder his sibling “because she would often leave her family’s home without permission and was missing for a while before her murder”, the source said.

“The suspect claimed that his sister, who was separated from her husband and living with her family, would often leave the house without their permission and they filed complaints against her,” the judicial source added.

Late Saturday night, the source said quoting the initial confession by the suspect, the suspects and their mother were informed about the victim’s whereabouts “in a building in Jubeiha with a strange man” and went to fetch her.

“They all met at the entrance of the building and the minute he saw his sister, the suspect pulled out a knife and stabbed her repeatedly,” according to the judicial source.

Meanwhile, the father reportedly “grabbed the 19-year-old man who was with his daughter and beat him up”, the source added.

“After the brother made sure his sister was dead, he headed towards the man and stabbed him repeatedly until he made sure he was dead too, then headed to a police station to turn himself in,” the judicial source maintained.

The mother, according to the judicial source, “is a witness to the murders and attempted to stop her husband and son from committing them”.

A team of government pathologists at the University of Jordan’s National Institute of Forensic Medicine, headed by Imad Abdullat, concluded that both victims died of multiple stab wounds, a senior medical source said.

“The wounds were caused by a sharp object and were concentrated in the victims’ chest area,” the medical source told The Jordan Times.

Bdairat ordered that both suspects be detained at a correctional and rehabilitation centre for 15 days pending further investigations.

Sisterhood Is Global Institute (SIGI) on Sunday issued a statement condemning the murder, describing the past week as “one of the bloodiest for women in Jordan”.

“Four women were killed over the span of three days in Jordan, including two [murders] that were committed in the name of family honour,” SIGI said.

The institute noted that it strongly condemns these murders that are “proof that the circle of violence against women in Jordan is still big”, adding that  “it is clear that there is a need to work on amending wrongful cultural beliefs and ensuring better legal protection for women”.