JEDDAH, 25 September 2006 — She pulled at the collar of her simple, faded-dress in order to cover her neck while she spoke with disgust about her father. When she described what had happened, she brought her legs together, lowered her gaze and choked on her words. Her voice rose in anger when she talked about how he treated her mother, how they had to endure his perverted behavior and how no one had stood by them — in the past and now in the present. After 24 years of suffering, the mother and her daughter finally had the courage and support to go to the police; however, there is still a long road ahead of them before they will feel safe.
In a society which refused to believe such abhorrent crimes occur and with a system that is ill equipped to assist the victims or handle their cases, people are left to suffer alone in silence. The girl’s mother married the man when she was 14 and he was much older. “I noticed his strange behavior and unnatural requests early in our marriage but I was young and ignorant and afraid to disobey or talk to anyone.”
Later she noticed his disturbing behavior around their then three-year-old daughter and with their other two daughters as well; he often went to their room late at night, claiming that he was only tucking them in. She suspects him of having molested their young son as well. Even the maids who worked for them over the years ran away or quit, and she thinks it was because of him.
All the time, whenever she told her family what she saw and suspected, they would either refuse to believe her or pray God to cure her — she is epileptic. “They always said I was crazy and didn’t know what I was talking about.”
The daughter, now 22, remembers incidents of sexual harassment when she was eight. “He told me these things were normal between a father and daughter and he bought me candy and gifts afterward. When I was young, I believed him but it didn’t feel right to me.”
At 13, his sexual harassment of her — the touching, the exposing — turned into sexual assault. “I began asking my friends and teachers indirectly as if talking about another girl. They told me that the girl I was talking about must be promiscuous or exaggerating. I then realized that what my father did to me was not normal.”
She began to refuse his advances and fought back, she avoided being alone with him or going out with him but it was difficult. “He would take advantage of me when my mother was out or was having one of her epileptic seizures but I would cry and scream. Then he began taking me to remote areas where no one could hear my screams and I would pass out from the pain.”
When she resisted him even more, he stopped giving her an allowance for school and delayed driving her in the mornings, causing her to be punished for being late. “I wasn’t doing well in school but I liked going just to be out of the house.” When she became too much trouble for him, he turned his attentions to the next daughter. “I didn’t want my sisters to suffer like me so I began warning them and urging them to resist him.”
Meanwhile, the mother sought her family’s help but to no avail. She is one of ten siblings in a poor family in Makkah. Her father did not want her back as a divorcee with children. None of her brothers or sisters wanted to help her or even listen to her. She broke down and sobbed, “They just wanted to leave us in our misery. My father threatened to kill me if I even thought of leaving home.”
Help finally came a few months ago when her uncle stayed with them while looking for a job. He saw and listened to them but when he tried to intervene, both her husband and father warned him not to, so he left.
Things escalated four months ago when her father came and ordered her to stop making the false accusations or he would take her to the mental hospital in Taif. After her husband and father left, she packed some of her things and called her uncle from a neighbor’s house. Her uncle came and took her and the daughter to the police.
The public prosecutor took their statements and ordered a medical examination which showed that the daughter was not a virgin. “The public prosecutor would not believe me at first and badgered me. He said I was making false accusations against my father and that I had a boyfriend, but after seeing that I was consistent in my statements, he insisted that they examine my father too and interrogate him so he was subpoenaed.”
During the confrontation, the father wept and begged her not to accuse him but under pressure, he finally admitted his insidious crimes. She was then transferred to a shelter for three weeks in order to be away from any outside influence while the file was being processed. The father has been awaiting trial in jail for the past three months.
The girl’s mother says in desperation, “What if they release him from jail for whatever reason or sentence him to only a few years? What if he is pardoned in the group of prisoners usually pardoned in Ramadan? He will take my children and send me to a mental hospital.”
Since he has been in jail, the family has had no income and no access to his salary. Their landlord has told them to pay the rent or leave the building. They have sought help from various charity organizations but so far, little has been achieved. Two days before Ramadan, they wrote a letter to the king, explaining their situation and asking for help but mainly pleading that the father be kept away from them. As the Saudi justice system exists now, there is no standard sentencing for sex offenders or any ruling to prevent such fathers from seeing their daughters or even from having custody of them.
