Mother duped teen into marriage Parent jailed after forcing daughter to marry man 16 years older in Pakistan

ABIRMINGHAM mum has been jailed for four-and-ahalf years for forcing her teenage daughter to marry a stranger in Pakistan.

The mother, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was locked up at Birmingham Crown Court on Wednesday.

She was previously found guilty of the forced marriage offence and a count of perjury after a two-week trial.

The mother was cleared of perverting the course of justice.

It is only the second time anyone has been convicted in court of a forced marriage in the UK.

The judge explained that the maximum term for forced marriage offences was seven years, but in this case he imposed three and a half years for forced marriage, and one year for perjury.

During the hearing, Deborah Gould, prosecuting, read out a victim impact statement in which the girl said her mother had “ditched” her in Pakistan.

She said she felt a after it happened.

And she urged other young women at risk of forced marriage to “say something to someone”.

During the trial, the court heard that, following the breakdown of the relationship between her parents, the victim, now 19, had a trou- “bad person” bled upbringing and, had been placed into home.

In 2012, when she was 13, she was taken by her mother to Pakistan and met her 29-year-old soon-tobe husband who made her pregnant. The pregnancy was terminated. But in 2016 the defendant took her daughter to Pakistan again, telling her it was for a holiday and promising to buy her an iPhone.

However when they got there, and after the victim had turned 18, her mother told her she was going to get married to the person who had impregnated her.

The mother said her daughter had no choice, that the man was wealthy at one time, a children’s and threatened to burn her daughter’s passport if she did not go through with it, as well as putting “bad spirits” in her.

The victim raised the sending texts to her sister.

The wedding took place on September 18 with video footage of it being heavily edited.

The defendant returned to the UK on October 21 without her daughter and when she appeared at a family court she lied, claiming her daughter was not married.

Deborah Gould, prosecuting, said the mother had achieved her aim through a combination of “grooming, manipulation control and coercion”.

The defendant claimed her daugh- alarm by ter had willingly gone through with the ceremony.

The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children issued a statement after the conviction,

It said: “No child should be forced into marriage, and this case shows that victims can come forward in the knowledge they will be listened to.

“Children as young as 13 have contacted Childline worried about being forced into marriage yet fearing they will be cut out of their community if they refuse.

“We would urge anyone worried about a child to speak up before it is too late, so that we can get help and prevent them being bound into something they would never ask for.”