FREE ZOORA SHAH! 'This is about a life destroyed, a family destroyed.' Posted Saturday 4 December 1999 "Alert for Action" "Alert for Action" "Alert for Action" Mobilisation for Zoora Shah Southall Black Sisters (SBS) are calling for a demonstration outside the: Home Office 50 Queen Anne's Gate London SW1H 9AT Wednesday 16 December 1999 from 12.30 p.m. - 2 p.m.. We urgently need your support at this time as we prepare to make representations to the Home Secretary to reduce Zoora Shah's excessive tariff of 20 years. She is in prison for killing a man who had financially, sexually and physically abused her for 12 years SBS will be presenting a petition of approximately 5,000 signatures to Jack Straw urging him to reduce Zoora Shah's excessive 20 year tariff resulting in her immediate release. Zoora Shah is currently in her eighth year of imprisonment and is desperate to be reunited with her children. We hope to have the presence of the Bradford MPs who are currently supporting her case as well as a number of celebrities. We promise to make the demonstration loud, irreverent and exciting but can only do it with your help. Please attend, tell your friends, family, everyone and help mobilise to make this demonstration effective. As we move into the millennium lets show activism is not dead! That Zoora and her children have suffered enough. Zoora Shah needs your support: Contact SBS for further information: 0181-571-9595 e-mail sbs@leonet.co.uk "Alert for Action" "Alert for Action" "Alert for Action" Background material on the campaign http://www.ncadc.demon.co.uk/satgiffs/zoora.html In solidarity: Southall Black Sisters 52 Norwood Road Southall Middlesex UB2 4DW. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted March 1998 Update Update Update Update Update Update Update The Court of Appeal dismisses Zoora Shah's case On 30th April 1998, Zoora Shah lost her appeal to overturn her conviction for the murder and attempted murder of Mohammed Azam on the grounds of diminished responsibility. Zoora's testimony - given for the first time - was dismissed as being 'not capable of belief', mainly because the Court decided that she was still lying just because she had originally lied to the police. In effect, she is now serving a life sentence for lying rather than for her culpability for murder. The Court ignored substantial independent evidence from her GPs, hospitals and lay witnesses showing that she was depressed and in a state of severe anxiety throughout her relationship with Azam and at the time of the killing. The Court rejected the evidence of a number of psychiatrists who had concluded that Zoora had been depressed over a number of years and was suffering from diminished responsibility at the material time. They rejected the testimony of an expert in transcultural psychiatry, who explained that Zoora's inability to tell the truth at her original trial stemmed from her fear of shame and dishonour, and from other cultural constraints. In seeking to justify such wholesale rejection of Zoora's case, the Court hinted that all the psychiatrists who concluded that she was suffering from diminished responsibility had simply been duped by her clever manipulations! A question of civil liberties: the right to a fair trial? The Court of Appeal's judgement has profound implications for civil liberties. The Court denied Zoora the right to put forward her defence - a defence not available to her at trial because she feared for the future well being of her daughters, and because she did not understand the nature of her own depression. The judgement has far reaching consequences for all vulnerable people who are unable to tell their story at the first instance because of mental illness, trauma, or fear of reprisals. It suggests that if you do not put forward one of the defences to murder at trial, you can never raise such a defence again unless there are exceptional circumstances. There is no indication as to what constitutes 'exceptional circumstances', but it seems to restrict the term to the narrow condition of severe mental illness. In seeking to develop a 'one trial' principle, the Court denied Zoora the right to any trial, let alone a fair trial, and usurped the function of the jury, since no jury has been allowed to hear the evidence first presented at her appeal: her own testimony and contemporaneous medical records. Racism and sexism The judicial reasoning of the Court of Appeal was deeply flawed in this case and lacking any compassion. The judgement is littered with ill-conceived and prejudicial misconceptions about women's experiences and responses to violence or abuse and the cultural contexts in which this is experienced. It rides on sweeping assumptions about the codes of shame and dishonour - key constraining mechanisms which bind many Asian women into silence and submission - bordering on racist stereoptypes. No attempt is made to recognise how these complex notions affect all Asian women, particularly those who are 'discarded' by their husbands and communities, and forced to live on the margins of their community through no fault of their own. The Court suggested that Zoora had 'no honour left to salvage' because she had been involved in sexual relationships, ignoring the fact that it was her status as a divorced, isolated and poverty stricken Asian woman which made her vulnerable to sexual and financial exploitation by a series of predatory men. In essence, the Court - and therefore the criminal justice system - has discriminated against Zoora because she does not fit the category of the 'fragrant housewife' and is therefore deemed to be undeserving of justice. The case of Shahir Hussain The Courts have been rather more willing to accept cultural and religious factors when used by Asian men to excuse the killings of wives and daughters, on the basis that 'their' wives/daughter's behaviour trangresses cultural norms, even when such men hold the balance of power in the family and community. Witness the recent case of Shahir Hussain - an Asian man from Bradford - whose murder conviction for deliberately mowing down his sister-in-law was quashed by the Court of Appeal. Subsequently, at his re-trial on 27th July 1998, a plea of guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of provocation was accepted by the prosecution. He argued at his re-trial that his sister-in-law had brought shame on the family by having an affair outside of marriage, that his family had been distressed by her behaviour, and that his religion and culture meant that any sentence in custody would be harsh. Compare the sentence of six and a half years which he received - making him eligible for parole next year - to the tariff of 20 years imposed upon Zoora Shah! Miscarriage of justice Ultimately, the criminal justice system in this country will have no option but to address the predicament of women in Zoora's position and the difficulties they face in obtaining justice. Defences such as diminished responsibility and provocation have to be as accessible to such women as they are consistently in favour of men if the suspicion of gender discrimination is to be dispelled. The bottom line is that Zoora, and women like her, should not be punished twice - first by their oppressors and then by the law. Zoora Shah urgently needs your help to end the injustice she has faced at the hands of her family, the community and now the law : SBS is currently working with Zoora's lawyers to explore avenues to secure justice for Zoora Shah, including: representations to the Home Secretary on the matter of her tariff - 20 years - which is excessive by all accounts in the light of her background. fresh evidence to bring her case back to the Court of Appeal. submissions to the European Court of Human Rights. You can help in the following ways Make a donation. The legal and campaigning work, currently undertaken without any funds, urgently requires contributions. Some of the campaign funds are also used to enable Zoora Shah's children to visit her in prison on a regular basis. Write to the Home Secretary urging him to reduce her tariff and secure her release. (See model letter enclosed - please send a copy to SBS, and please use your letterhead if you are writing on behalf of your organisation.) Sign the petition which we hope to present to the Home Secretary in November with her legal representations on her tariff (Please return all petitions to SBS by the end of November.) Affiliate to the campaign to free Zoora. Raise the issue with your MP, pass resolutions of support in your groups or organisations, and encourage others to support the campaign. AFFILIATED ORGANISATIONS Aberystwyth Women's Aid _Ajani Centre for Women and Girls, Leicester _Asian Women's Monitoring Group, Bradford _Asian Women's Resource Centre _ASHIANA - Asian Women's Refuge,Sheffield _ASHIANA Project, London _ASSRA Project - Refuge, Brighouse _Bazm-E-Urdu - Bradford Literature Project _BECTU _Birmingham Tribunal Unit _Bradford Racial Equality Council _Brent Asian Women's Refuge _Calderdale Women's Aid, Halifax _Chin,Bradford _Daniel & Harris, Solicitors _Fire Brigades Union _Firth Part Advice Centre _Glasgow Working Group on Women, Religion and Violence _Hackney Women's Aid _Harrow Women's Centre _Independent Immigration Support Agency, Birmingham _Indian Workers Association, Bradford _Inquest _Irish Women's Centre _Jewish Women's Aid _Justice for Women, London _Justice for Women, Manchester _Justice for Women,West Yorkshire _Keighley Domestic Violence Forum _Keighley Women's Aid _Kirklees Asian and Black Women's Refuge _Kirklees Rape Crisis and Black Women's Project _Lancashire Council of Mosques _Leeds Women's Aid _Liberty _Manningham Housing Association, Bradford _Muslim Parliament _Muslim Welfare Health Centre _National Association of Probation Officers _Newham Asian Women's Project _Newham Monitoring Project _Northern Complainant Aid Fund, Bradford _Oxford City Council - Women's Sub-committee _Saheli Refuge, Manchester _Sheffield ABC _Sheffield Domestic Violence Forum _Shipley Women's Aid, Bradford _Tower Hamlets Domestic Violence Forum _University of Essex _Women Against Fundamentalism, orth _Women and Health _Women in Scotland and Europe _Women's Support Project, Glasgow Affiliated Individuals Diane Abbott, MP Anabel Jacqueline Bech A. Benson Rahim Kaur Binjie K. Butson Sharon Charikar Anne Cryer MP, Keighley Lord Desai Dr. Susan Edwards Harry Fletcher M. Fox Sarah Horn Shabir Hussain A.K. Gill Shirley Ginever Celia Jenkins Mahmoud El Kurdi, Imam P. Leith Lanis Levy E.A. Llewellyn Jaqui Long Fay Marshall Sonya Mayor M. MacAlpine Frances McNeil Caroline Natzler Hailey V. North Mahine Rizvi Rosie Robinson Terence Rooney MP, Bradford North Asima Shaikh Marsha Singh MP, Bradford West Gerry Sutcliffe MP, Bradford South Meera Syal Ruth Teddern Mona Vadher Sara Wajid Model Letter: The Rt Hon Jack Straw MP Home Secretary Queen Anne's Gate London. SW1H 9AT Fax: 0171 273 3965 Date: Dear Jack Straw Re: The case of Zoora Shah I/We are writing to voice our grave concern about the controversial Court of Appeal judgement of 30 April 1998 which upheld Zoora Shah's conviction for the murder of Mohammed Azam, and the decision of your predecessor to impose a tariff of 20 years. We request that you look into this case as a matter of utmost urgency for the purposes of reviewing her excessive tariff of twenty years and indeed her continuing imprisonment. l/We understand that Zoora Shah was forced into a life of dependency by Mohammed Azam who befriended her when she was deserted by her husband and let's in a destitute state Although Zoora made the mortgage repayments on the house in which she and her children lived, Azam used the fact that it was technically in his name to trap her in a sexually and financially exploitative and, at times, violent relationship. Azam was subsequently convicted for ten years for dealing in heroin. After 12 years of degradation, Zoora killed him in a moment of utter desperation. Zoora was tried and convicted at Leeds Crown Court in December 1993. With the help of Southall Black Sisters and a new legal team Zoora Shah appealed against her conviction by presenting new evidence - her entire medical history and her own testimony which had never been heard before. On the basis of the new evidence, some psychiatrists at the Court of Appeal concluded that Zoora was suffering from depression, whilst others went further in concluding that she was suffering from diminished responsibility when she committed the offences. The Court of Appeal judgement has displayed a deep ignorance of women's responses to domestic/sexual violence and racist indifference to a number of significant cultural constraints. The judgement also suggests that if you do not put forward one of the defences to murder at trial, you cannot do so later unless there are exceptional circumstances which appear to be defined narrowly as severe mental illness. This has profound civil liberties implications for a wide category of vulnerable people who may not be able to tell their full story at trial, amounting to the denial of their right to a fair trial. We believe that the Appeal court usurped the function of a jury by dismissing her testimony as being 'not capable of belief'. The recent, public declaration by the jury foreman from Zoora's original trial that the evidence presented at appeal casts doubt on their original verdict vindicates that view. (The Guardian, 30 September 1998) Defences such as diminished responsibility and provocation have to be as accessible to such women as they are to men if the suspicion of gender discrimination is to be dispelled. Zoora Shah's case highlights the difficulties faced by Asian women in speaking out about the sexual abuse and domestic violence that they have suffered. They have little or no idea as to how to access the 'appropriate' support services, often speak no English, are constrained by notions of shame and honour and do not have the support of their families. It was only after Zoora Shah was given support and counselling by Southall Black Sisters that she eventually gave what appears to be a full and frank account of her circumstances. We understand that significant sections of the Muslim religious leadership, such as the Lancashire Council of Mosques and the Muslim Parliament are now supporting her case, although it was the lack of support from the Bradford religious establishment and community that compounded the isolation faced by Zoora in the first place. In my/our view, Zoora Shah's case represents a gross miscarriage of justice. It appears that she knew no life other than one of grinding poverty and relentless sexual violence. Zoora Shah was a loving and committed mother. She had no previous convictions. She looked after many disabled children whose families have stated that she was a hard working and irreplaceable carer. This is not a dangerous killer who poses a threat or danger to the public. Zoora's experiences deserves understanding and compassion. The Court's decision punishes not only Zoora but also her children whose lives have been devastated by her continuing imprisonment. They have had to cut short their education in order to financially maintain themselves. Zoora Shah's eldest daughter has in effect been denied her youth as she has had to take on the role of being both mother and father to the youngest two children. In my/our view there are no valid arguments for Zoora's continuing incarceration. It does not serve the public interest to keep her in jail. She and her children have been punished twice over once by their community and now by the law. I/We demand that you address the wrong perpetrated by the legal system on Zoora Shah. I/We look forward to your response. Yours sincerely, affiliation form I/We wish to affiliate to the Free Zoora Shah Campaign. I/We wish to make donations of Name: Organisation Address Tel. No: Return to: Free Zoora Shah Campaign c/o SOUTHALL BLACK SISTERS 52 Norwood Road, Southall Middx UB2 4DW Tel: 0181 571 9595 Fax: 0181 574 6781 E-mail FreeZooraShah@ncadc.demon.co.uk Back Ground FREE ZOORA SHAH! Zoora Shah is currently serving a life sentence for the murder of Mohammed Azam - a man from the criminal underworld of Bradford who sexually and economically exploited her over a period of 12 years. Zoora's story Zoora, a non-literate Muslim woman from rural Mirpur in Pakistan, came to Bradford in the early seventies following an arranged marriage. She was beaten by her husband and his family and forced to undergo several abortions in order to avoid the birth of girls. She lost one baby as a result of her husband's violence and another through ill-health. Abandoned by her husband and thrown out by his family, Zoora found herself with her three young children, homeless and destitute, and unable to speak any English. Tired of moving from one squalid room to another, she was befriended by Azam, a married man with children, who helped her buy her own house in his name as she was unable to obtain a mortgage. She paid the deposit and made the mortgage repayments with benefits, earnings from her factory work and savings. But the help was at a price - Azam demanded sexual favours in return. Their relationship quickly turned into a sexually abusive one. He forced her to have sex as and when he wanted to - in the cemetery where her children were buried, in the back of cars in the presence of the driver, at home while her children and relatives were in the next room, while she was recovering from various operations and illnesses, often two or three times a day. Azam would become violent when Zoora refused to do his bidding. He possessed a number of firearms and kept a knife in his car. He used the technicality of the house being in his name to control her behaviour. At first Zoora was unaware that Azam was a drug dealer. On one occasion, when Zoora returned from Pakistan without carrying the drugs - heroin - that Azam had demanded, he took her to the cemetery, grabbed her hair, hit her and then forced her to have sex. When Azam was convicted of dealing in heroin and sent to prison for ten years, he tried to pimp Zoora to male inmates on the point of release. One of the men that he sent to her was his brother in law. Zoora was constantly being harassed for sex by men - sometimes gave into these demands because Azam was threatening to evict her and sometimes she reported them to the police without much success. Her house had become a prison for her - she could not free herself from Azam's hold over her. In her desperation, Zoora turned to community elders for help but they refused. On one occasion, she went to see Azam's brother - Sher Azam - who was a prominent leader and head of Brdford Council of Mosques but he said he could do nothing. World Out of Control Zoora then turned to the only people around her - men who belonged to or had connections with the criminal underworld in Bradford. One such man was an Asian taxidriver who forced her to have sex with him, threatening to tell her family that she was a prostitute' if she refused. In Zoora's eyes, however, he was less abusive and even gave her money so she became very dependent on him for advice. Instead of advising her to legitimise her position in court, he encouraged her to forge Azam's signature to transfer the house into her name. In a further misguided attempt at escape, she allowed herself to be trapped into agreeing to beating and then killing Azam by a man who turned out to be a friend of the Azam brothers and had taped their agreement to kill' Azam with Azam's prior knowledge. Azam reported this to the police but neither he nor the police took the matter seriously enough. Azam did not end the relationship, instead he punished Zoora by tightening his grip on her. His thugs broke into her house, broke the windows and damaged the furniture while her son and uncle were asleep, although Zoora herself was in Pakistan, as a warning shot. Driven to despair, Zoora bought arsenic in Pakistan which, in small doses, makes men sexually impotent. She used it on Azam in February 1992 and got a month's relief from his sexual demands. Throughout her married life and relationship with Azam, Zoora suffered from depression and illness. She had so many abortions that she cannot remember them all and was continuously on anti-depressants and pain killers. Zoora attempted suicide on a number of occasions but did not see them through because of her children. The Last Straw In the last phase of her relationship with Azam, Zoora felt less and less in control of any aspect of her life - in particular her sexuality. She faced relentless demands for sex by Azam and the other men. Azam humiliated Zoora by calling her and her daughter common prostitutes' in front of his wife. The turning point in their relationship came when Zoora suspected that Azam had sexual designs on his daughters. She feared for her eldest daughter who had been persuaded into entering a business relationship' with him. Zoora went to considerable effort to protect her daughters. She sent her eldest daughter to Pakistan and even arranged her marriage. She was deeply ashamed and sick of the life she led, "I was used as a mattress by all the men in the community." In April 1992, Zoora finally snapped when Azam began showing a sexual interest in her youngest daughter who was twelve at the time. She give Azam a larger dose of arsenic not caring whether he lived or died. The dose proved fatal and Azam died the same day in hospital. The Trial. Zoora was charged with a number of offences: Murder, attempted murder, solicitation to murder and forgery. Zoora did not give evidence at her trial. She was too ashamed to reveal the painful details about her sexual history. She was petrified of the impact of the revelations on her daughters and their future prospects of marriage. Zoora preferred to plead not guilty to the charges. She was found guilty on all counts and convicted for life for murder and given concurrent sentences for the other offences. Zoora has already spent 5 years in prison of a life sentence which carries a tariff of twenty years.. The issues Domestic violence: Although the issue has been very much in the public eye because of a number of high profile cases of battered women like Kiranjit Ahluwalia and the Zero Tolerance campaign, legal definintions of domestic violence continue to restrict its meaning to physical violence in marriage. The experiences of many women do not fit this narrow definition. Zoora was turned into a sexual slave by the economic hold that Azam had over her, despite the fact that they were not living together. Our work and that of other women's groups show that domestic violence encompasses a range of abusive behaviour by husbands, partners, family members and others with whom women have long standing relationships. Escape? There are few avenues of escape open to women who have sustained long-term abuse, even more so if they happen to belong to a minority. Zoora was too ashamed to tell her GP about the reality of her life. The police failed to protect her. Her entire world was the Bradford community. She could not conceive of life anywhere else. Afraid of the unknown and afraid of racism, she preferred to live in Bradford even if it meant as an outcaste. Community stranglehold Zoora belongs to the Mirpuri community - largely known for its ultra conservative values, especially in relation to women. Azam came from the Pathan community - sections of which are even more conservative and patriarchal in their outlook. Azam's brother is a well-known and powerful community/religious leader, who shot to fame as the instigator of the anti-Salman Rushdie campaign in this country. Together, the various communities, closed in behind the respectability' of Azam's connections to outcaste Zoora, the destitute, easily portrayed as the evil' woman. The men that Zoora met were all part of this shady world of a tightly knit community in which people were linked by crime and kinship. Azam often told her that there was nowhere that she could run to because he had friends' everywhere. Poison In the last century, women in the West resorted to the use of poison to escape abusive relationships. Many were sentenced to hanging or life imprisonment since the since the stifling social mores of the time could not show an understanding of their experiences. In the USA, female slaves often resorted to the use of poison to escape rape and sexual abuse, amongst other acts, by their white masters. The use of poison by Zoora was not the act of a cunning' and evil' woman driven by greed. It was the desperate act of a woman unable to take control of her sexuality and life. The Bradford community is perhaps even more oppressive for Asian women than it was for women living in the nineteenth century. Many Asian women from northern England have been killed, in recent times, for daring to break with the codes of their religion and culture. Women in the legal system The legal system is shot through with male assumptions about domestic violence and women's responses to such abuse. The early nineties saw a decade of intense battles within the criminal justice system to correct male bias, particularly within the defences of provocation and self-defence - all contructed around male norms of behaviour'. Whilst hard campaigning has led to some progress, the law continues to refuse to confront its own rejudices thus denying them equal access to justice. In sharp contrast, men continue to elicit sympathy from the legal system, even if their killings are based on dubious excuses of nagging' and adultery'. On recent example is the case of David Swinburne who received a 200 hours community sentence for killing his wife. The judge commented that his imprisonment served no useful public interest. The legal system must be accountable to the range of women's experiences of domestic violence by reflecting the complex realities of women's lives. The circumstances and perceptions of women like Zoora who are niether mad' nor bad' must be understood. Her history of physical and sexual degradation cries out for recognition and understanding. It demands a new legal thinking and the courage to end the injustice that she faced at the hands of her family and community, and now at the hands of the law. A radical re-thinking of the existing defences to murder and the abolition of the mandatory life sentence is necessary. It is an anachronism that in the late twentieth century, the English legal system cannot meet the challenge of distinguishing between those who kill out of self-interest and power from those who do so out of despair and rage borne out of the impoversihed and oppressive conditions of their lives. Zoora Shah has suffered enough. She has already been in prison for five years. She is traumatised and haunted by her past. She must be immediately released and re-united with her children so that they can piece together their lives as a family. The campaign demands: * Freedom for Zoora * Recognition by the legal system of the full range of women's experiences of physical, sexual and mental abuse within the notion of domestic violence * Reform of the existing defences to murder * Abolition of the mandatory life sentence * Better resources and services for women who face domestic violence especially for those in minority communities Zoora's appeal is due to be heard on 31 March, 1,2, 3 April 1998 at the Royal Courts of Justice in the Strand, London There will be demonstrations outside the court for the duration of the hearing. Your presence in the public gallery and outside the court is extremely important to Zoora. PLEASE ATTEND! Please sponsor the campaign and/or make donations to the "Free Zoora ShahCampaign" c/o Southall Black Sisters 52 Norwood Road, Southall Middlesex UB2 4DW. If you need more information ring, Southall Black Sisters Tel. 0181 571 9595 Fax: 0181 574 6781