Double murder: we did our best, say police

WEST Midlands Police have defended their actions in the hours before the knife murder of a mother and daughter in Solihull on Monday, insisting officers did their best to respond during a busy bank holiday weekend.

Raneem Oudeh, 22, was on the phone to police when she and her mother, Khaola Salee, 49, were attacked and killed outside their home.

It later emerged that Miss Oudeh, who has a two-year-old son, had called police several times in the hours before she died to report domestic abuse.

Yesterday, a £5,000 reward was issued for information leading to the arrest of Janbaz Tarin, 21, Miss Oudeh’s ex-boyfriend, who is being sought in connection with the attack.

Miss Oudeh, originally from Syria, had made a series of calls to police on Sunday to report Mr Tarin. Officers responded to the first call but were unable to locate her. She then made more phone calls to police but officers did not attend in person.

Police were dispatched for a second time after Miss Oudeh rang to say Mr Tarin had confronted her at her mother’s address at 12.30am on Monday. Tragically, they arrived too late as both women received fatal stab wounds.

Det Ch Supt Mark Payne said: “Unfortunately, we can’t always be everywhere and on the night in question we did our absolute best, but we weren’t able to get there in time to prevent a double murder.” He added that as it was a bank holiday, there were “lots of calls coming in”.