Sara Sharif judge raises alarm about 'dangerous' home schooling used to hide domestic abuse
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A top judge who jailed the killers of Sara Sharif has raised the alarm about unsupervised home schooling, after it was used to hide signs that the ten-year-old was being abused. Sara died at the hands of her own father, Urfan Sharif, and stepmother Beinash Batool, who subjected her to years of barbaric torture and beatings at the family home in Woking, Surrey.
When she had bruising, Batool used make-up to conceal the marks and eventually the little girl was forced to wear a hijab to cover her damaged skin. Sharif withdrew his daughter twice from school after teachers spotted signs of abuse and raised concerns, and the second occasion was just a few months before she was murdered.
During his sentencing remarks at the Old Bailey on Tuesday, Mr Justice Cavanagh acknowledged that the case had raised “safeguarding concerns”, including that Sharif was given custody of his daughter despite being “on the radar of various authorities as an alleged perpetrator of domestic abuse”.
He said his role is not to comment on whether anything could have been done to save Sara, telling the court: “The primary responsibility for the death of Sara rests squarely with the three of you who are before me for sentencing.”. But he added: “This case brings into sharp relief the dangers of unsupervised homeschooling of vulnerable children.
