During the four years of his sexual abuse of his daughter, his wife knew what was happening but did not go to the police. Why?

According to Dr. Mahmoud Abdulrehman Mahmoud, a practitioner of community medicine and drug researcher in Jeddah, who also works with victims of domestic violence, the reasons may vary from culture to culture. It may simply be a matter of physical intimidation by the husband, threats of violence should his wife report his vicious, predatory crime.

“To analyze (why women fear reporting domestic and sexual abuse) point by point, there is the matter of cultural variation, and also the difference from country to country, and from family to family," he said. "The husband might be the main figure in the woman’s life, and she might have developed a dependent personality. She needs the husband for support and feels handicapped by fear. In her mind it is set that even if she speaks out against him, society won’t support her. His family and even her own family may not support her. She feels that no one will be able to surpass her husband’s control over her life and the life of her daughter.”

The doctor says that a woman might "sacrifice her daughter" to the horrors of sexual abuse in order to protect the family from the shame that would rip it apart.

“To save girls from fathers who rape them is a very complex problem; first we cannot generalize it, and unless the victim or someone close to the victim speaks out it, is very hard to find out it's happening in the family," said the doctor.

In recent years, Saudi Arabia has woken up to the problem. Doctors and teachers are being encouraged to report signs of sexual abuse to authorities. And hospitals are increasingly stocking so-called "rape kits" that can be used to collect physical evidence before its loss, such as the presence of bodily fluids (DNA evidence) or bruises and lesions caused by the violence.

“Hospitals in the Kingdom have been instructed that when a patient comes in, and it is a suspected case of abuse, data is collected at the hospital by a physician who examines the victim," said the doctor.

This data can then be submitted through the Committee for Protection from Abuse as physical evidence in court in hopes of prosecuting these criminals.

Still, the all-important citadel of family privacy, of paramount importance in Saudi Arabia, can make it difficult for outside intervention in domestic and sexual abuse cases that take place inside the home. Stopping sexual abuse, much less prosecuting the family member who commits the bloody crime, almost always requires a family member to act.

Last year The Hamaya Society for Family Protection gave refuge to a woman who was brave enough to file a criminal complaint against her father, whom she claims had been sexually molesting her since the age of three.

“In my opinion the fastest way to save a girl from an abusive father is immediate family intervention," said the doctor. "The whole family should come together against him and without delay separate the daughter from him, so he cannot harm her again. And then file a complaint with the authorities.”