What we know as Sara Sharif's father and stepmother found guilty of her murder

The mother of 10-year-old Sara Sharif has said she hopes the girl’s father will die in prison, after he was found guilty of her murder.

Urfan Sharif, 42, and Sara’s stepmother, Beinash Batool, 30, were found guilty of murder on Wednesday, while Sara's uncle Faisal Malik was not found guilty of murder but was found guilty of causing or allowing the death of a child.

The court had previously heard that during her short, traumatic life, Sara suffered more than two years of abuse before she was killed on 8 August 2023.

Following the verdict, Sara’s mother, Olga Domin, 38, told The Sun that she hopes Sharif will die in jail, saying: “It’s not human to do this stuff to your own child.

“I can’t believe he was hitting her belly when she was dying. I still can’t manage that. They should all get the same for what they were doing. Monster is too nice word for him anyway.

“I hope he will be dying in jail.”

Following Sara’s death, Sharif, Batool, and Malik left the country, travelling to Islamabad, Pakistan a day after the murder.

Sara's body was discovered at her home in Woking on 10 August, and the three adults were arrested when they returned to the UK on 13 September.

Bitten, beaten and burned

The court heard Sara suffered a “daily living hell” at the hands of her family during 'inhuman' violence which was 'completely normalised' in the family.

Sharif, her father, admitted beating the 10-year-old with a cricket bat, metal pole and even a mobile phone. However, he denied biting her or using an iron or boiling water to burn her, despite the claims of the prosecution.

Jurors were told the schoolgirl had evidence of multiple broken bones and that it was believed she had been hooded and tied up at one point.

“Excruciatingly” painful iron burns to her body are believed to have required at least two people to inflict, which, when put to Sarif, prompted the reply that it “must have been kids”.

Video footage from a family barbecue also appeared to show Sara with black eyes, indicating further beatings.

At one point, the court even heard these were delivered with the same force as “if she had fallen from a second storey roof again and again and again”.

‘All my fault’

Sharif’s confession after seven days in the witness box turned the trial on its head.

The 42-year-old taxi driver had previously denied killing his daughter, but under questioning told the court he took “full responsibility” for Sara’s death, adding: ”She died because of me.”

He admitted beating the 10-year-old “severely” over several weeks because he had been angry at her for soiling herself and vomiting, including striking her across the abdomen with a metal pole as she lay dying.

Sara had previously begged her parents for forgiveness for “being rude” in a letter uncovered after she was battered to death in her own home.

Before the trial, Sharif had previously appeared to admit killing his daughter in a phone call to emergency services and in a handwritten note, before pleading not guilty to murder and manslaughter charges.

On the stand, however, he told the court: “I want to admit that it’s all my fault. I want the court to consider my full note and confession.

“That I admit what I said in my phone call and my written note, every single word.”

Following this, his wife Sara’s stepmother Batool left the dock sobbing and the trial was briefly suspended.

Sharif's defence lawyer, Naeem Mian KC, suggested only his wife Batool knew the truth of how Sara died, but had opted not to give evidence.

Wife ‘made’ father beat his daughter

Batool declined the opportunity to give evidence herself.

Prosecutors claimed violence against Sara had become “normalised” in the family home, pointing to injuries such as burn marks on her body they believed would have taken multiple people to inflict.

Despite this, Sharif had previously tried to shift responsibility onto Batool, branding her “evil” and a “psycho” just days before admitting culpability himself.

Watch: Sara Sharif's stepmother says 'no comment' when asked if she loved her

Under questioning, he suggested he was “made to” beat Sara on the 30-year-old’s instruction after his daughter was accused of fighting, hiding food, cutting her own hair or scribbling on walls.

He also claimed Batool was responsible for bite marks on Sara’s body which he denied inflicting.

Sharif and his brother Malik provided their dental impressions to show they were not responsible for the bite marks, but Batool refused to provide hers, the court was told.

Sharif told the court he had returned home one day to find his wife had bound Sara’s hands with packing tape.

Uncle pleaded ignorance of abuse

As well as her stepmother, Sara’s uncle Malik was also accused of being party to her murder.

According to prosecutors, the 10-year-old died as a result of a sustained “campaign of abuse” in the family home she shared with her father, stepmother and uncle.

Malik, however, claimed to have been unaware of what was going on.

In March 2020, a neighbour, Chloe Redwin allegedly heard children screaming and the mother shouting “shut the f*** up” and “go to your room you f***ing bastard”.

She told of loud smacking followed by “gut-wrenching screams” of a young girl, the court heard.

University student and part-time McDonald’s worker Malik moved in in December 2022 and was present when screaming and slapping was going on, according to Ms Redwin.

However, Sharif also insisted that everything was kept separate from Malik because he would have told their father.

‘Bubbly’ schoolgirl smiling through pain on camera despite brutal injuries

Sara was remembered as a “bubbly, confident, chatty, engaging child”, but which her own father attempted to beat out of her with “cruel punishment and degrading treatment”.

Footage of the 10-year-old showed her laughing and joking despite the attacks regularly meted out to her by members of her family.

By the end of her short life, even as the physical abuse took its toll on her young body, her happy spirit could still be glimpsed, caught on camera smiling and dancing at home - despite enduring the excruciating pain of multiple broken bones and iron burns to her body.

Incontinence and vomiting enabled Sharif to justify ever more brutal attacks, including tying her up with packing tape and covering her head with a homemade hood.

Prosecutor William Emlyn Jones KC claimed violence against Sara had become so “normalised” no-one was phased by her bruises during a family barbecue.

At times, she was even made a hijab to hide her injuries, it was claimed in court.

Remembering Sara, teaching assistant Hayley Holden said: “She was a little feisty. If she had an opinion she would voice it and she was not afraid to answer back. She never spoke about her home life.”

On the occasions school staff did ask the 10-year-old about her wounds, she would reportedly bury her head in her arms, turn away and refuse to speak.

When teachers reported their suspicions to social services, she was withdrawn from school altogether. This left her under the care of her “beautiful” young stepmother Batool, who put Sara to work doing laundry and housework.

But Batool refused to accept her stepdaughter's “rebellious” nature and would regularly complain about her to her husband, knowing, the prosecution claimed, what the consequences for Sara would be.

Schoolgirl was ‘invisible’ to authorities

Social services missed a final opportunity to intervene in Sara’s family just months before her death.

Despite an outward veneer of respectability, hints of the horrors at home were occasionally glimpsed.

This included Sara’s teachers witnessing stepmother Beinash Batool swearing at children at the school gates and bruises on the 10-year-old’s face in June 2022 and March 2023.

Sara had been dressed in a hijab in an apparent attempt to hide the wounds.

But a referral to social services following the March 2023 incident was shut down within days and a month later she had been withdrawn from school altogether.

A former neighbour, Rebecca Spencer, remembered hearing children’s screams reaching “fever pitch” when she lived above the family’s former flat in West Byfleet, Surrey, between 2018 and 2020.

But despite considering reporting her concerns to the authorities, she ultimately decided not to, jurors were told.

Following the verdicts, children’s commissioner Dame Rachel de Souza said the case highlighted “profound weaknesses in our child protection system”.

She said: “There can be no doubt that Sara was failed in the starkest terms by the safety net of services around her.

“Even before she was born, she was known to social care – and yet she fell off their radar so entirely that by the time she died, she was invisible to them all.”

Surrey Police has so far declined to comment on the suggestion there may have been safeguarding failures related to Sara’s death.

Timeline of events

2019

Sara’s father Urfan Sharif granted custody of his daughter, who moves in with him, his wife and his brother

2022

June

Sara’s school notes she had a bruise under her left eye

2023

January

Sara begins to wear a hijab

March

Sara’s school notes she had a bruise on her chin and a dark mark on her right eye

9 August

Urfan Sharif, his partner Beinash Batool and Faisal Malik travel to Islamabad, Pakistan.

10 August

The body of Sara Sharif, 10, is found at the family's home in Woking, Surrey. A murder investigation is launched.

15 August

A post-mortem examination shows Sara suffered “multiple and extensive” injuries likely to have been caused over a “sustained and extended” period of time.

18 August

Surrey Police say they would like to speak to Sharif, Batool and Malik in relation to the investigation.

20 August

Surrey County Council confirms Sara was known to the local authority.

29 August

An inquest into Sara’s death is opened at Surrey Coroner’s Court and hears the precise cause of her death is “not yet ascertained”.

13 September

Sharif, Batool and Malik land in the UK at Gatwick Airport on a flight from Pakistan via Dubai, and are arrested on suspicion of murder.

15 September

Surrey Police says the trio have been charged with Sara's murder and causing or allowing the death of a child.

14 December

The trio plead not guilty to murder and causing or allowing the death of a child and are remanded into custody.

2024

14 October

Trial at the Old Bailey, in London, begins and hears Sara was “beaten” and suffered what were “probably human bite marks” before she died.

15 October

Jurors told neighbours heard a “single high-pitched scream” of “someone in pain” just days before Sara died and that her father had told police he was “cruel” over the phone while apparently confessing to her killing.

16 October

Court hears Sara had suffered more than 70 injuries in the run up to her death.

17 October

Expert witnesses tell the Old Bailey Sara had been strangled so severely in the months before her death a bone in her neck was broken.

18 October

Court hears Sara had 25 unexplained fractures, likely caused by “multiple episodes of blunt force trauma inflicted over several weeks”.

23 October

Neighbours give evidence, recounting conversations about Sara’s hijab and incidents of “fever pitch” screaming from the family home.

24 October

A neighbour claims Sara “never smiled once” in the months before her death.

25 October

Jurors told neighbours heard a girl scream “in pain” just two days before Sara’s death.

31 October

Court heard Sara’s stepmother Beinash Batool suggested the 10-year-old had a “jinn in her” which was responsible for her behaviour.

5 November

Sara’s father Urfan Sharif takes to the witness stand to begin his defence.

6 November

Urfan Sharif denied beating his daughter and instead claimed his wife was the “crazy” one in the house.

7 November

Urfan Sharif claims he caught his “psycho” wife tying Sara up with packing tape.

13 November

Urfan Sharif tells jurors he “takes full responsibility” for his daughter’s death. He later states he did not mean to kill her.

15 November

Urfan Sharif denies stripping and jetwashing Sara’s battered body in the garden of the family home as he prepared to flee to Pakistan.

18 November

Sara’s stepmother, Beinash Batool, and her uncle, Faisal Malik, decline to give evidence at the trial.

3 December

Jury retires to consider verdicts for Urfan Sharif, 42;Beinash Batool, 30; and Faisal Malik, 29.

11 December

Jury finds Urfan Sharif and Beinash Batool guilty of Sara’s murder. Faisal Malik was found guilty of causing or allowing her death.