The father and stepmother of Sara Sharif, a 10-year-old girl who was severely abused and later found dead in her home in England, have been given life sentences for her murder.
Urfan Sharif, 42, and Beinash Batool, 30, were convicted of murder last week in her death in what prosecutors called a “campaign of abuse”.
The girl’s uncle, Faisal Malik, 29, was found guilty of causing or allowing the girl’s death. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison.
Her father later took her out of school to prevent authorities from discovering the abuse, the judge said. She was not schooled at home.
Olga Sharif called her daughter’s killers cowards, sadists and executioners, in a statement read by a prosecutor.
“I can’t understand how someone can be such a sadist to a child,” she said.
“She is now an angel who looks down on us from heaven, she is no longer experiencing violence.”
During the trial, Sharif initially accused Batool of Sara’s death but later admitted to the jurors that he was fully responsible. He confessed to choking her with his hands and hitting her with a cricket bat and other objects.
The prosecution said the violence became so normalized that no one reacted when she appeared with bruises at a family barbecue.
Her parents made her wear a hijab — not for religious reasons — but to “cover up the bruises that were all over Sara’s body”, Cavanagh said.
Sara was described as a spirited girl who always dreamed of being a princess from a fairy tale. Two days before her tragic death, a video captured her dancing at home despite having multiple broken bones and burns from an iron on her body.
“Despite everything, she smiled at the camera,” the judge noted.
