‘Honor killing’ scourge endures
Houston crime reflects millennia of misogyny
The centuries-old crime of honor killing, stretching back to ancient Rome and present in the Middle East and Latin America, is taking place in America at a rate of more than 20 a year, according to a recent U.S. Justice Department report.
It’s a phenomenon that has concerned women activists given continued migration from countries where honor killings are still reported, although they remain rare in the United States when compared to other homicides.
But over the last several weeks, the ancient scourge has been highlighted in a Houston courtroom as details have emerged about a pair of killings masterminded by Ali Mahwood-Awad Irsan, a 60-year-old Jordanian immigrant.
A Harris County jury last month convicted Irsan in “honor killings” of his daughter’s husband, 28-year-old Coty Beavers, and her close friend, Gelareh Bagherzadeh, 30, in two seperate shootings in 2012. Prosecutors also presented evidence that Irsan had killed another
son-in-law nearly two decades ago.
The same jury is determining this week whether Irsan should face the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole for his crimes.
“You don’t have to be Muslim to be a victim of an honor crime,” said Michael Creed, the older brother of Coty Beavers. “These are not infrequent events that happen in some random part of the world. They’re happening in America, and they’re on the rise.”
In a planned vendetta of breathtaking scope, prosecutors said the husband and a close friend of Irsan’s daughter, Nesreen, were only the first two slated to die for helping her run away from her home in a rural Montgomery County compound and convert to Christianity.
Irsan’s plan to ultimately kill five people — including daughter Nesreen — in the name of family honor ranks as perhaps one of the worst of its kind in the U.S. in recent years, although experts differ on whether religion or culture drives this disturbing category of violent crime. Those who study honor crimes were taken aback by the extent of the murderous plan and how it reached into the lives of people who knew little about the culture of honor killings.
Creed is among a growing number of people who feel Americans should wake up to the possibility that a fanatic, bent on committing murder to “wash their honor in blood,” can destroy the lives of people who have never even heard of an “honor killing.”
“If certain people who believe in honor killings feel that a daughter or a sister is becoming too ‘Westernized,’ then the friends or individuals who support them are considered expendable and can be killed,” said Creed, who faithfully attended a trial that is stretching into its eighth week.
‘Deep in their DNA’
Irsan was convicted of fatally shooting Beavers at the apartment he shared with Nesreen. In an earlier incident, he drove to a Galleria-area townhouse and watched as his oldest son allegedly ambushed his daughter’s close friend, fatally shooting her in the head as she spoke on a cellphone while sitting in her parked vehicle.
During the sentencing phase, prosecutors called witnesses who testified that he murdered a different son-in-law in 1999 by blasting him with a shotgun after inviting him to his Montgomery County home. Irsan planted a gun on his body and escaped criminal charges by claiming self-defense before bragging to a neighbor he had gotten away with murder, testimony showed.
Because honor killings generally only extend to the death of a young woman, experts consider Irsan’s most recent plan to kill his daughter, her best friend and his daughter’s husband and two other in-laws to be one of the most extensive they have seen, especially in America.
Amy Logan, an author and expert on honor killings who is the CEO of Gender Innovation, said the scheme was “twisted” because several women in the household, including Irsan’s wife and another daughter, apparently helped him carry out his plans.
“A hit list with multiple people is interesting,” Logan said. “And disturbing.”
She said some immigrants from Muslim-majority countries have trouble assimilating and raising their children because they were raised in places where women were seen as property, not people.
“The code of honor runs so deeply in their DNA that it can be tough to raise children in the United States with such a different value system,” Logan said.
She stressed that Islam does not support honor killings, and while most happen in Muslim families, most Muslim families do not believe in honor killings.
“There are many, many Muslims who are against it, and it needs to be separated from Islam,” she said.
‘The threat is real’
In 2000, the United Nations released a report estimating about 5,000 honor killings are committed around the world every year. Women’s advocacy groups put the number at closer to 20,000.
A report commissioned by the U.S. Department of Justice in 2015 estimated there are 23 to 27 honor killings each year in the U.S. In the last decade, there have been high-profile honor killings in Arizona, New York and Texas.
One of the most notorious cases involved the deaths of teenage sisters Amina and Sarah Said near Dallas in 2008. Their father, an Egyptian immigrant, remains the main suspect and is still a fugitive. To raise awareness about the issue, and maybe find the father, filmmakers made the movie “The Price of Honor” to document the circumstances of the killings.
Shortly before Amina was killed, she and a young man named Joseph Moreno fell in love. Joseph’s mother, Ruth Trotter, learned about abuse that Amina and Sarah were going through and tried to plan an escape. After their deaths, Trotter became a vocal advocate for victims of honor violence.
She said Irsan’s case reminded her of the Said case because prosecutors have filed charges against family members who allegedly helped Irsan with the killings.
“It is so similar to what we went through with Amina,” Trotter said. “The threat is real. The fear is real. Whether it’s one person or two persons or 10 persons, they are going to do what they are going to do.”
She and other advocates noted that law enforcement needs to be more aware of the risk of honor violence when it comes to minors and especially runaways.
A runaway who tells a police officer that she cannot go home because she fears for her life may not be taken seriously, both Logan and Trotter noted.
To raise awareness, both said there needs to be better data. The problem with getting accurate numbers in America and other countries is that families who commit honor killings do not cooperate with authorities. That means deaths may not be reported, or when they are, they may be chalked up to suicides or random violence.
Difficult to track
Advocates note that Beavers’ death, which could have been reported as a random home invasion, is indicative of the way that numbers can be misleading.
The FBI tracks hate crimes in America, but not alleged honor killings, according to Conner Hagen, a public information officer at the Houston office of the FBI.
To help combat the practice, the AHA Foundation was established by author and activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali in 2007 to end female genital mutilation, honor violence and forced marriages.
According to the organization, honor killings often involve several people in the family.
In Irsan’s case, his second wife testified against him that she and their oldest son stalked their targets, then worked together to kill Beavers and Bagherzedeh.
His wife, 40-year-old Shmou Ali Alrawabdeh, has agreed to plead guilty to kidnapping. Their son, Nasim Irsan, is in jail on a charge of capital murder for his involvement. One of Irsan’s other daughters, Nadia Irsan, faces stalking charges for her part in the alleged scheme.
During the trial, Irsan’s wife and nephew both explained how the patriarch was upset that his daughter Nesreen — who married Beavers in 2012 — brought shame to the family and determined he had to “wash their honor in blood.”
Beavers’ brother said he believes there are more honor killings in the world and in the U.S. than statistics show.
“You almost don’t believe that it’s real and that it exists,” Creed said. “As you start digging into it, you find that it is real and it’s not rare. It happens frequently, and it happens so frequently that the numbers are skewed because it’s not reported because in some parts of the world, women just aren’t valued as human beings.”
‘He’s not a devout Muslim’
Witnesses in the case against Irsan alternated between saying that Irsan was motivated by Islam or his upbringing in his homeland of Jordan.
Irsan appears to be a fervent Muslim. State District Judge Jan Krocker maintained a court schedule with specific breaks to accommodate his request to pray several times a day.
However, Muslim advocacy groups say the Quran does not allow honor killings.
“He’s not a devout Muslim,” said Mustafaa Carroll, executive director of the Houston office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “If he was, he would know that the Quran does not allow killing except in defense.”
Carroll said he knows many Muslims and many Jordanians, and none condone honor killings.
“There’s no honor in killing,” Carroll said.
Professor A.Kadir Yildirim, a fellow for the Middle East at the Baker Institute at Rice University, said religion is often the justification, not the cause, of murderous plots to restore family honor.
“Religion obviously will play into this in some fashion, as people will try to justify it in religious terms,” he said. “This is is not unique to Islam. This is not limited to the Middle East. The main dynamic to honor killings is the presence of tribal dynamics. Cultural bonds are very strong. Jordan is one of those countries where tribal affiliations are very strong.”
Yildirim said there are no historical or modern Islamic scholars who justify honor killing on religious grounds.
He said honor killings in America are so infrequent that the crime does not need to be tracked as a separate category of domestic violence. However, he said combatting honor killings should be part of the broader fight to end violence against women.