Rukshana Naz was seven months pregnant and living in the U.K. when her mother and two brothers allegedly strangled her, stuffed her body into a sack, and then dumped her in a field.
Officials first learned of the crime after one of Naz’s brothers confessed the murder to his girlfriend, who then reported the crime to police. The mother allegedly held her daughter down while her two sons strangled their sister with some type of cord. Ruskahana’s brothers Iftikhar (18), Shazad (22), and her mother Shakeela (45), have all denied these accusations.
Prosecutor James Hunt QC argued that 19-year-old Rukshana Naz was murdered because her family believed that she had disgraced them by becoming pregnant. Hunt said, “The family were angry that Rukhsana had become pregnant by her boyfriend in England when she was married to a man in Pakistan.” Naz had entered an arranged marriage at age 16 and had two children by him.
