They Tried to Force Their 16-Year-Old Daughter Into Marriage! She was a daughter, a student, a young woman with dreams of her own. But to her parents, she was property—a bargaining chip, a transaction, a vessel for family honor. When she refused the marriage they had arranged for her, they didn't listen. They drugged her. They beat her. They dragged her to another country. And when she still refused to submit, they did the unthinkable. In this episode of Deadly Crime, we expose the horrifying reality of forced marriage and honor-based violence—crimes that happen in plain sight, within families that claim to love their children. We uncover the cases of young girls who were sold into marriage, abused, and murdered when they dared to choose their own futures. We begin with Shafilea Ahmed, a 17-year-old from Warrington, England, who dreamed of studying law. She wanted to wear Western clothes and talk to boys. She wanted a life of her own. Her parents, Iftikhar and Farzana Ahmed, had other plans. In February 2003, they drugged her and took her to Pakistan for a forced marriage. In a desperate act of resistance, Shafilea drank bleach to stop the wedding, causing severe damage to her throat. She returned to England, spent weeks in the hospital, and spent her 17th birthday on a hospital ward. Just one week after enrolling in college, she was found dead. Her parents had suffocated her with a plastic bag in their living room, in front of her siblings, in a so-called "honour killing." They were convicted of murder and sentenced to 25 years in prison. But Shafilea was not alone. We also explore the case of Banaz Mahmod, a 20-year-old Iraqi-Kurdish woman from South London who was forced into an arranged marriage at just 17. Her husband, a decade older, repeatedly raped and beat her. When she finally escaped and fell in love with a man of her own choosing, her father and uncle hired hitmen to hunt her down. Banaz was kidnapped, raped, tortured, and strangled with a bootlace. Her body was stuffed into a suitcase and buried beneath a house in Birmingham. The investigation that followed would transform how British police handle honour-based violence. And we tell the story of Somaiya Begum, a biomedical science student at Leeds Beckett University who was nearly forced into marriage with her older cousin in Pakistan at just 16. She refused. She reported her parents to the police. She sought protection. She moved in with her uncle for safety. But in June 2022, that same uncle, Mohammed Taroos Khan, locked her in a room, strangled her, and dumped her body in a field. He was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. What drives a parent to kill their own child? Is it culture, religion, or something far darker—a pathological need for control that overrides every maternal and paternal instinct? We dissect the psychology of honor-based violence, examine the systemic failures that leave victims unprotected, and ask the haunting question: how many girls are still trapped in the shadows, praying for the strength to say no? This is Deadly Crime. Press play—if you dare. Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/deadly-true-crime--7310460/support.
