Rabia Sarwar Tried To Slit Husband Sheikh Naseem's Throat For Making Her Eat Pork, Wear Short Skirts

COLLEEN LONG | 10/30/09 03:38 PM | AP
NEW YORK — A devout Muslim woman told police she slashed her husband's neck with a kitchen knife as he slept because he forced her to eat pork, wear short skirts and drink alcohol in violation of her religious beliefs.

Rabia Sarwar, 37, pleaded not guilty to attempted murder and was freed on $25,000 bail. She told police in a written statement that she was emotionally abused by her husband, Seikh Naseem.

"He made me do so many things that are against Islam," she wrote in a statement to police.

"I did all that just to make him happy but inside me there was a war," she continued.

Naseem suffered cuts to his neck, cheek and hand early Wednesday before fighting Sarwar off and dialing 911 from his Staten Island home, authorities said.

"I did my best to cut his throat," Rabia Sarwar wrote. "But the next moment he jumped on me and grabbed me."

Sarwar's attorney, Joe Licitra, said she had previously been treated for depression. Her husband told the New York Post that Sarwar, a native of Pakistan, was having a hard time adjusting to American culture.

"There was no gun pointed to her head to do these things," Naseem told the Post.
Story continues below

Calls to Naseem by The Associated Press went unanswered.

Sarwar's statement to police paints a picture of a frustrated, confused woman angry that her husband of five months was not what he appeared to be during their brief courtship. Naseem went to her family to ask for a bride and she agreed to marry him, she said in her statement.

But after they were wed, she discovered he had previously dated mostly "white" women, had been married before and liked to go out to drink, she wrote. He said he was Pakistani and a devout Muslim, but in New York he claimed he was half-Pakistani and half-Norwegian, as well as a Unitarian Christian, she said.

He often yelled and cursed her family, she said, and one of his favorite writers was Salman Rushdie, author of "The Satanic Verses," which caused violent protests by Muslims in several countries because the book was perceived as an irreverent depiction of the Prophet Muhammad.

"He hates Pakistan and he hates Pakistanis then why did he marry a Pakistani girl?" she wrote.

They fought about her leaving, and he threatened to hurt her family, saying they would have to pay him $30,000 or he would sue them and leave them penniless and homeless, she wrote. Her family is in Pakistan.

She lay in bed that evening thinking her only way out was to kill him, she wrote.

Police said they had never visited the house on any domestic dispute calls.

Sarwar also pleaded not guilty Thursday to second-degree assault and criminal possession of a weapon.

According to Sarwar's statement, Naseem was working on getting her green card, but her parents had apparently started the citizenship process for her a few years before. She is not a U.S. citizen and could face deportation, depending on the outcome of the case.

Her next court date is Monday.


Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/30/rabia-sarwar-tried-to-sli_n_340392.html

Saudi king scraps flogging for female journalist

Saudi king scraps flogging for female journalist
She was charged with working on TV show where a man talked about sex

updated 10:18 a.m. ET, Mon., Oct . 26, 2009

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia - The Saudi king has waived a 60 lashes punishment for a female journalist charged with involvement in a TV show in which a Saudi man publicly talked about sex, a government official said Monday.

King Abdullah's decision followed intense media attention sparked by Saturday's sentencing of journalist Rozanna al-Yami, who was ordered flogged by a judge in the western city of Jiddah.

Al-Yami had been charged with involvement in the preparation of a sex talk show and public talk about sex is taboo in this ultraconservative country, where the sexes are segregated.

Al-Yami — believed to be the first Saudi woman journalist to get a flogging punishment — said Saturday that although the charges against her were dropped, the judge sentenced her "as a deterrence."

On Monday, Information Ministry spokesman Abdul-Rahman al-Hazza told The Associated Press that the king waived the sentence and ordered al-Yami's case and that of another journalist — a pregnant woman also accused of involvement in the program — be referred to an Information Ministry committee.

Al-Yami, 22, worked as a coordinator for the program but has denied involvement in the sex talk episode.

During a hearing Monday also connected to the sex show, the judge told the second female journalist, Iman Rajab, that her case was also being referred to the Information Ministry committee.

The committee, which usually has a Justice Ministry representative but no judges sitting on it, deals with media-related violations, al-Hazza said.

'Bold Red Line'
The case started in July, when the Lebanese LBC satellite channel aired the sex talk episode as part of its program entitled "Bold Red Line."

In the episode, a divorced Saudi father of four who works for the national airline, Mazen Abdul-Jawad, appears to describe an active sex life and shows sex toys that were blurred by the station in the footage shown on TV.

'Sex braggart' gets 5 years for TV talk
Female journalist sentenced to 60 lashes

The government moved swiftly in the wake of the case, shutting down LBC's two offices in the kingdom and arresting Abdul-Jawad.

The same judge at the Jiddah court also sentenced Abdul-Jawad earlier this month to five years in jail and 1,000 lashes.

The man's lawyer, Sulaiman al-Jumeii, maintains his client was duped by the TV station and was unaware in many cases he was being recorded.

Three other men who appeared on the show were also convicted of discussing sex publicly and sentenced to two years imprisonment and 300 lashes each.


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33478876/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa/

Child porn charges filed against priest

October 21, 2009 Posted: 05:19 PM ET

________________________________________________________

Father Robert M. Timchak was charged on Monday with 17 counts of sexual child abuse for allegedly having files of naked, underage boys on his computer.

Gabriel Falcon
AC360° Writer

A Roman Catholic priest in Pennsylvania has been charged with more than a dozen counts connected to child pornography, authorities said. “I would believe that our community would be distressed upon hearing these allegations,” Pike County District Attorney Raymond J. Tonkin told CNN.

Tonkin said Father Robert M. Timchak surrendered on Monday and is now free on bail. Timchak, who was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Scranton in 1992, was charged with 17 counts of sexual abuse of children, one count of criminal use of a communications facility, and one count of tampering with or fabricating evidence.

“There are no allegations at this time related to the actual touching of any children,” Tonkin said. “The allegations at this time are related to the possession of child pornography on his computer.”

The case against Timchak began, authorities said, with an anonymous letter sent to the Diocese of Scranton last December.

The affidavit of probable cause alleges “the letter contained explicit photographs and comments of young males, possibly children, that reportedly had been recovered during a search of the email address 'booker1441.'”

The Diocese gave the letter to the District Attorney’s Office. According to the affidavit, in a police interview in April, Timchak acknowledged that he had an email account under booker1441.

After seizing his desktop and laptop computers, investigators said they found “graphic files containing young males in sexually explicit poses and/or acts. The graphic files contained nude or partially clothed males exposing their genitals. The males appeared to be under the age of 18.”

In a statement, the Diocese of Scranton said it “is saddened by the situation regarding Father Robert M. Timchak. These charges are distressing and would be very unfortunate if proven true.”

Timchak was pastor and assistant pastor at several parishes in recent years. He has also served as the director of religion formation at two Catholic high schools.

He has been on a leave of absence from the Dioceses since April.

http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2009/10/21/child-porn-charges-filed-against-priest/

Police: Man ran down 'too Westernized' daughter

(CNN) -- Arizona police are looking for a man who they allege ran down his daughter and her friend because he believed his daughter had become "too Westernized."

Police say they're looking for Faleh Hassan Almaleki, who they say struck two people with a vehicle Tuesday.

Peoria, Arizona, police said Wednesday that Faleh Hassan Almaleki, 48, struck his 20-year-old daughter, Noor Faleh Almaleki, and her friend Amal Edan Khalaf with a vehicle he was driving in a parking lot Tuesday afternoon.

Faleh Hassan Almaleki was angry with his daughter "as she had become too 'Westernized' and was not living according to [the family's] traditional Iraq[i] values," Peoria police said in a statement released Wednesday.

Noor Faleh Almaleki is hospitalized with life-threatening injuries, according to the statement. Khalaf, 43, received injuries that are not life-threatening but is still in the hospital, police said.

Noor Faleh Almaleki lives with Khalaf, police said.

Faleh Hassan Almaleki was last seen in a gray or silver Jeep Grand Cherokee, police said.

No further details were immediately available.

Peoria is about 13 miles northwest of Phoenix.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/10/21/arizona.iraqi.daughter.struck/index.html