JEDDAH, 31 October 2004 — A family here has been terrorized by their armed live-in relative for the past few years. The man, a former police officer now turned drug addict, has a violent disposition according to family members.
In one of numerous police cases filed against him, he stands accused of putting a gun to his son’s third grade teacher’s head. This came about when it appeared that the teacher would fail the son for the second year in a row. An order for the man’s arrest in this case was issued, but despite his still living at home, the police have not been able to apprehend him. The problem that the police are faced with is that he is the male head of household (mahram), and his permission is needed for male police officers to enter the house. For as long as he stays inside and doesn’t come to the door or answer the telephone, the police cannot enter.
In Saudi Arabia, the home is sacrosanct. Due to cultural traditions in Saudi society protecting women from the eyes of other males, no man, not even a police officer, can enter a home without the permission of the mahram. In this case, the police have come to his house several times but were not allowed entry.
“This summer we called the police to come get him. When they came, they asked where the ‘mahram’ was. We told them he was the one upstairs with the gun. At that point they left. When the police left, he packed his things up and left for three months. But now he’s back with a vengeance,” his nephew told Arab News.
The house they live in belongs to the matriarch of the family, this man’s mother. At 4 o’clock yesterday morning, she went into cardiac arrest at a Jeddah hospital. Doctors were able to resuscitate her, but she now remains in a coma.
In the past two years according to family members and police reports filed at Al-Safa and Al-Salama district police stations, this individual has stabbed his nephew and a man who was proposing to marry his niece.
“He is addicted to methamphetamine and is constantly paranoid thinking we are all out to get him. Now our mother is dying and he’s threatening to harm us if we go near our house. Our mother is still alive and the house is in her name. We haven’t been able to go home because we’re scared of him. Every time the police came to the door, he refused to give them permission to enter. I guess the police got fed up and referred us to an elder who is respected in our district. When we went to this elder, he said he would try to convince our relative to turn himself in. When the elder went to our house, our relative wouldn’t open the door for him. He disappeared for four months and has since come back and now is threatening us and our children,” his sister told Arab News from her mother’s bed at the intensive care unit of a local hospital.
Arab News watched as the family made yet another telephone call to 999. After explaining the situation to the policeman over the telephone, they were given three telephone numbers to the Al-Safa district police station. All three numbers were disconnected. A call to 905 provided two other numbers, one of which was also disconnected. The fourth number worked. After explaining the situation to the policeman over the telephone, they were told to try to call back the following day.
Arab News contacted Interior Ministry spokesman Brig. Gen. Mansour Al-Turki regarding the police’s failure to come to this family’s aid. He told Arab News: “The family must file a complaint at the district police. Since the man is an armed fugitive who is threatening his family with a gun, he must be arrested.”
The brigadier contacted the head of police operations in Jeddah. He told Arab News, “I am surprised. Please have the family contact the district police station and speak to a lieutenant. If you still can’t get any help from him call me back and I will get involved.”
The fugitive’s sister contacted the police by telephone. A lieutenant there told them to come to the station to file a police report in person. She explained that her brother would “kill” her if he found out that she had filed a new report. She told the policeman that she had filed a report during the summer with a police lieutenant, and that was when she was referred to the neighborhood elder. With this new information, the policeman told her that since the case was filed with another lieutenant, she would have to contact him. When she called, she was told the lieutenant was on holiday.
Determined, the woman went to the Al-Safa district police station in person to file a new report. There, she was told that there were no police cars available and that the police person in charge who could order a forced entry into the house to arrest the wanted man, was not available until tomorrow.
“The police told me that they had no cars to come to the house. They offered to come in our car and talk to him. If they talk to him without even a police car, do you really think he is going to open the door? As soon as we drop the policeman back at the station, my brother will disappear for a while, and will eventually come back to extract his revenge,” the sister told Arab News.
Arab News came to learn of this situation at noon yesterday. At the time of going to press some nine hours later, the fugitive remained comfortably at home.
