Posted on 12/12/2007 9:14:43 AM PST by doc30
16-year-old's love of dancing, fashion and photography brought her into conflict; father now faces murder charge
Aqsa Parvez was largely estranged from her family and sleeping away from home in recent days. The 16-year-old's friends said she returned to her home in Mississauga on Monday only to collect her belongings.
Shortly afterward, she was taken to hospital, where she died early Tuesday morning – leaving friends grief-stricken and igniting a public debate on religious extremism in Canada.
Her father, 57-year-old taxi driver Muhammad Parvez, is charged with murder. Her brother, 26-year-old Waqas Parvez, is charged with obstructing police.
Ms. Parvez's friends described the Grade 11 student at Applewood Heights Secondary School as someone who was drawn to Western culture even as her family adhered to a devout form of Islam. Friends paint a picture of a hardworking and cheerful girl who loved dancing, fashion and photography – interests that often clashed with her strict home environment.
“Aqsa was always trying to get us to go shopping with her,” schoolmate Dominiquia Holmes-Thompson said. “We were supposed to go to the mall together today.”
Last week, Ms. Parvez temporarily moved in with a friend from school.
“She said she wasn't getting along well with her family and that things weren't right,” said Trudy Looby, the mother of one of Ms. Parvez's friends, Alisha. “When she was here, she was very happy.”
Ms. Looby said she told Ms. Parvez to inform her parents about where she was staying. “She notified me that the school was aware of where she was staying and that that was okay,” the mother said.
During her stay, Ms. Looby said, Ms. Parvez didn't wear the hijab, a head scarf that friends said was a hot topic within her family.
Krista Garbutt remembers walking down the street with Ms. Parvez earlier this year, when the two of them spotted Ms. Parvez's brother walking toward them. Panicking, the teenager quickly fumbled for her head scarf, trying to put it on. “There were times when we'd be walking down the street and she'd see her brother and she wouldn't be wearing her hijab and she'd have to put it on,” Ms. Garbutt said. “She said, ‘He'll kill me, he'll kill me.' I said, ‘He's not going to kill you,' but she said, ‘Yeah, he will.' And nobody believed it.”
On Monday morning, Peel Regional Police responded to a 911 call from a man who said he had just killed his daughter. When officers arrived at a single-family detached home on Longhorn Trail, they found Ms. Parvez suffering from life-threatening injuries. She was taken immediately to Credit Valley Hospital and later transferred in critical condition to the Hospital for Sick Children, where she died.
Peel police said the Crown is waiting to decide whether Mr. Parvez should be charged with first- or second-degree murder, pending a police investigation. Although police would not elaborate on the ongoing homicide investigation, the difference between laying a first- or second-degree murder charge often rests on proving that the killing was premeditated.
Ms. Garbutt said the teenager went home on Monday to collect her belongings, at which point her father “basically went ballistic.”
For weeks before, Ms. Parvez had been living something of a double life, friends said.
“She wanted peace with her family,” Alisha Looby said. “She wanted to make them happy but she wanted to be herself at the same time, and there's nothing wrong with that.”
A makeshift memorial is already in place at Applewood Heights, full of mementoes and messages left by grieving students.
“Aqsa was honestly the brightest girl around. She had the biggest smile and was the happiest person in school. She loved to dance and take pictures,” one student wrote.
Across Canada, the killing has taken on larger proportions. On call-in shows and websites, many have used the incident as part of a wider indictment of fundamentalist Islam. One Canadian conservative blogger suggested Canadians boycott taxicabs driven by Muslims.
In a statement Tuesday, the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations called on Canadians of all faiths to address issues of domestic abuse, and called for “the strongest possible prosecution” of those responsible for Ms. Parvez's killing.
Trudy Looby, who let Ms. Parvez stay at her home last week, said she now wishes the teen had not left.
“I was feeling that whatever it was she was dealing with at home was a bit too personal to involve me in,” Ms. Looby said. “I wish she would have stayed longer, that's all. It's a sad waste of life.”
Also, the Globe and Mail isn’t allowing comments on this article. I wonder why?
The most recent article on Fox’s website has a quote from an Islamic official who wants to be sure people don’t think of this as an Islamic issue. He says it’s a teenage issue, as if fathers across the cultural spectrum murder their rebellious teens.
You should google to see what’s going on with Mark Steyn in Canada right now. That might answer your question.
Well, technically it's not. It's a Middle Eastern tribal culture issue, and there are many tribes around the world which believe children are the property of their parents.
I googled Mark Steyn and Canada and didn’t see it. What’s going on?
“A chill wind is blowing...”
Well, then, if this isn’t how Muslims behave, then if this guy is guilty that must mean that he’s not a Muslim. Thus, he can be provided with a prison diet of bacon and beer.
The CIC, which describes itself as “Canada’s largest national non-profit and wholly independent Islamic organization,” has launched human rights complaints against Maclean’s in response to the article “The Future Belongs to Islam,” an excerpt from Mark Steyn’s book “America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It.” The article appeared in the magazine’s Oct. 23, 2006 issue.
Similar case in St. Louis some years ago - fortunately, the FBI had the house bugged for terrorist suspicions and ended up with a recording of the father stabbing his daughter to death while she screamed for her mother to help her.
He ended up in prison, can’t remember if the Mom did or not.
Religion of Love.
Hey Canada. Free speech. Steyn is the only Canadian writer that I know the name of.
Mooselimbs portraying more “peace” (as in, the peace of the grave)
Klingons would find no Honor or even consistance in the “Relgion of Peace.”
Klingons would find no Honor or even consistance in the “Relgion of Peace.”
Kinda sounds like her friends were idiots. When are people going to realize that Islam is a dangerous ideology that causes it’s adherents to murder people? How many innocent victims must Muslims kill before they take notice?
Two things stand out here. "Religious extremism"? You mean a Presbyterian or a Catholic might murder his daughter for not wearing a hijab or properly bowing down to her father? No, the word is "Islam," but that cannot be mentioned, even when it is obvious.
The second is "debate." Debate? What, between those who think it's OK for a Muslim to murder and disobedient daughter, because it's a cultural thing we should respect, and those who think it's wrong?
Good grief. What's to debate? This is wrong. He should be punished as a murderer of a particularly evil kind. And it's not religious extremism, it's Islam that is clearly at the root of this all-too-typical killing.
If a Christian took a strap to his daughter for running wild, that would be universally deplored. But if a Muslim murders his own child, half the country thinks maybe that's OK.
Technically you are right but it is still inextrictably tied to Islam. The sad part is there is apparently no central authority in Islam who can state the proper form of worship or cultural practices for Muslims. Nor do Muslims have a process of ex-communication to communicate to others that certain things aren’t accepted by the faith. I don’t blame Islam directly but I do consider it complicit.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.