65-year-old woman charged with murder of daughter in ‘honour crime’

AMMAN — The Criminal Court prosecutor has charged a 65-year-old woman with the premeditated murder of her married daughter for reasons related to “family honour” earlier in the month in Mafraq.

The 39-year-old victim received one fatal stab wound to the heart allegedly by her mother while at her home on March 11, Police Spokesperson Lt. Col. Amer Sartawi said.

“We were informed that a woman stabbed her daughter and we headed to the crime scene and arrested the mother without any major incident,” Sartawi told The Jordan Times.

A senior judicial source told The Jordan Times that the victim had marital problems with her husband and returned to live with the suspect almost two years ago.

On the day of the incident, the senior judicial source maintained, the victim felt pain in her stomach and went to see a doctor with the suspect.

The woman and her mother were informed by the physician that the victim was five-month pregnant, according to the senior judicial source.

“The physician congratulated the mother telling her that her daughter was pregnant,” the senior judicial source said.

When the pair returned home, the senior judicial source said quoting initial testimony of the suspect, “the mother grabbed a kitchen knife and stabbed her daughter once in the chest”.

When investigators and the police arrived at the house, the senior judicial source maintained, “the suspect claimed that she murdered her daughter in a moment of rage after learning of her pregnancy”.

“The suspect told investigators that she committed the murder to cleanse her family’s honour,” according to the senior judicial source, based on initial questioning of the suspect by the Criminal Court’s prosecutor.

A second medical source told The Jordan Times that the victim died of a single stab wound that “penetrated the victim’s heart causing her immediate death”.

The senior judicial source said that the criminal court prosecutor had questioned the victim’s family members and husband to learn more about the incident.

“Everyone was ruled out in the family, including the victim’s male siblings, of any involvement in the stabbing death of the woman,” the senior judicial source said.

Investigators concluded that the mother was the “sole perpetrator in the stabbing incident, and she remains detained at a women’s correctional and rehabilitation centre for 15 days pending further investigations”.