Father and stepmother of murdered schoolgirl face sentencing at Old Bailey

Sara Sharif’s father and stepmother are being sentenced today for murder after inflicting a deadly campaign of abuse which saw the schoolgirl being hooded, restrained and beaten during her short life.

Her father Urfan Sharif, 42, and stepmother Beinash Batool, 30, were found guilty of her murder last Wednesday.

Her uncle Faisal Malik, 29, was also convicted of causing or allowing her death after a jury at the Old Bailey deliberated for nine hours and 46 minutes.

Sara, 10, died at the family home on 8 August last year after suffering a catalogue of 70 injuries which included a traumatic brain injury, 25 fractures, an ulcerated burn to her buttocks, human bite marks and scalding wounds.

The girl’s father had alerted Surrey Police to her death by calling its non-emergency 101 line in the early hours of 10 August 2023, after fleeing to Pakistan with Batool and Malik.

The trio are being sentenced at the Old Bailey.

Last week, Sara’s mother, Olga Domin, who is from Poland, claimed Urfan Sharif, her former partner, had also attempted to set her on fire and strangle her with a belt before murdering their daughter.

Sara’s grandmother Sylwia Kurz said: “This [murder of Sara] would not have happened if [Sara] had stayed with her mother.”

Children’s Wellbeing Bill to be introduced to government

09:00 , Holly Evans

As part of previously announced reforms to children’s social care, the Government said it would be introducing a new duty on parents where, if their child is subject to a child protection inquiry or is on a child protection plan – meaning the child is suspected of being at risk of significant harm – they will need local authority consent to home educate them.

The plans, under the Children’s Wellbeing Bill, also include requiring local authorities to have registers of children not in school, in a bid to avoid children slipping under the radar.

The Bill has not yet begun making its way through Parliament, but it is understood it could be introduced in the Commons as early as next week.

England’s Children’s Commissioner, Dame Rachel de Souza, has described it as “madness” that an at-risk child could be taken out of school, and called for a change in the law so children who are suspected victims of abuse cannot be home educated.

She called on the Government to bring in its reforms “without delay”.

The Department for Education has said its plans will bring in greater safeguards for children in home education “so this can never be used to conceal abuse”.

Sara Sharif’s grandfather says he will fight to keep her siblings in Pakistan

08:50 , Holly Evans

Sara Sharif’s grandfather says he will fight to keep her siblings in Pakistan, calling it the “safest place for them”.

Muhammad Sharif, paternal grandfather of the murdered 10-year-old, said he will appeal to the High Court in Pakistan to stop Sara’s five siblings from being returned to the UK, the Sunday Times has reported.

Sara’s siblings remain in the city of Jhelum with efforts to return them to the UK still ongoing.

Their identities are protected by a court order.

They were taken to Pakistan by Urfan Sharif, Sara’s step-mother Beinash Batool and her uncle Faisal Malik on 9 August last year, a day before Sara’s body was discovered in a bunk bed at the family home in Woking, Surrey.

Upon arrival, they were left in the care of their paternal grandfather but were taken into state care after being discovered by Pakistani police during efforts to locate Sharif, Batool and Malik.

The children are now back in the care of their grandfather.

He told The Sunday Times said: “The legal proceedings concerning the custody of the children are ongoing in the Lahore High Court.

“They are enrolled in a reputable school, and we ensure their safety by personally transporting them to and from school.

“I am their guardian and this is the safest place for them to live in, they have an association with me and they are not willing to leave me. We will win the case.”

Sara’s parents had been known to social services as early as 2010

08:39 , Holly Evans

Following the conviction of Sara’s father Urfan Sharif, 42, and stepmother Beinash Batool, 30, for her murder, and uncle Faisal Malik, 29, of causing or allowing her death, previously unreportable details about the family’s contact with social services and the courts have been published.

They include:

– Concerns were raised about Sara’s care within a week of her birth in 2013, with her parents Urfan and Olga Sharif known to social services as early as 2010.

– Surrey County Council repeatedly raised “significant concerns” that Sara was likely to suffer physical and emotional abuse at the hands of her parents.

– There were three sets of family court proceedings but allegations that Urfan Sharif was physically abusing Sara and her siblings were never tested in court.

– Sara was repeatedly returned to her parents’ care before finally being placed with her father and stepmother at their home in Woking in 2019, four years before she was murdered there.

Parents were known to social services

08:30 , Sam Rkaina

In his trial, Sharif initially blamed Batool for the violence before dramatically accepting “full responsibility”, leaving jurors open mouthed and tearful.

He later appeared to backtrack, denying he had bitten or burned Sara or covered her head in a hood.

Jurors heard that bite marks on Sara’s arm and thigh did not match either Sharif or Malik and only Batool had refused to give impressions of her teeth.

Jurors heard that Sharif had been granted custody in 2019, despite earlier allegations of child abuse and arrests for alleged controlling behaviour towards ex-girlfriends.

In documents later released by the family court, it emerged that concerns were raised about Sara’s care within a week of her birth in 2013, with her parents known to social services as early as 2010.

Surrey County Council repeatedly raised “significant concerns” that Sara was likely to suffer physical and emotional abuse at the hands of her parents.

There were three sets of family court proceedings, but allegations that Sharif was physically abusing Sara and her siblings were never tested in court.

Sara was repeatedly returned to her parents’ care before finally being placed with her father and stepmother, four years before she was murdered.

Abuse ‘became normalised’ trial told

08:10 , Sam Rkaina

Even as she lay dying in Batool’s lap last August 8, taxi driver Sharif had come home and whacked her in the stomach for “pretending”.

Batool had told her sister that Sharif would “beat the c**p” out of his daughter but failed to do anything to stop it, even calling him home from work to dish out punishments, the court was told.

The abuse had become so “normalised” that university student Malik failed to act after moving in with the family in December 2022.

By January 2023, Sara began wearing a hijab to cover up the bruises at school.

Teachers had twice noticed marks on her face and referred her to social services last March, but the case was dropped within days and the following month Sara was taken out of school.

Within hours of Sara’s death, Sharif and Batool had booked flights to Pakistan for the whole family, including her siblings and half siblings.

The defendants returned to the UK on September 13 2023 – leaving the children behind – and were detained within minutes of a flight touching down at Gatwick airport.

Father and stepmother to be sentenced today

07:48 , Sam Rkaina

Sara Sharif‘s father and stepmother will be sentenced later for killing the 10-year-old after years of horrific abuse.

Last week, Urfan Sharif, 42, and stepmother Beinash Batool, 30, were found guilty of her murder following a trial at the Old Bailey.

Her uncle, Faisal Malik, 29, who lived with them, was convicted of causing or allowing her death after a jury deliberated for nine hours and 46 minutes.

The three defendants will return to the Old Bailey on Tuesday when Mr Justice Cavanagh’s sentencing is expected to be broadcast from the court.

Sara was found dead in a bunkbed at her home in Woking, Surrey, after her father rang police from Pakistan to confess he had beaten her “too much”.

She had suffered more than 25 broken bones, iron burns on her bottom, scalding marks to her feet, and human bites during a campaign of abuse spanning at least two years.

Sharif had hit her with a cricket bat and iron bar, throttled her, and thrown a mobile phone at her head.

Sara was also tied up with packaging tape and her head covered with a makeshift hood during regular bouts of punishment that would have left her in excruciating pain, jurors had heard.