A Saudi preacher who tortured his five-year-old daughter,Lama al-Ghamdi to death has been released after agreeing to pay ‘blood money’, activists said.
Lama al-Ghamdi died in October having suffered multiple injuries including a crushed skull, broken ribs and left arm, extensive bruising and burns.
The child had also been repeatedly Molested and the burned.Lama suffered multiple injuries including a crushed skull, broken ribs and back, bruising and burns. She had been molested repeatedly and died of her injuries in October
Her father Fayhan al-Ghamdi, a prominent Islamist preacher who regularly appears on television in Saudi Arabia, served only a few months in jail despite admitting having used a cane and cables to inflict the injuries.
Activists from the group Women to Drive said the preacher had doubted Lama’s virginity and had her checked up by a medic.Randa al-Kaleeb, a social worker from the hospital where Lama was admitted, said the girl’s back was broken and that she had been repeatedly molested.
Her injuries were then burned.
Rather than the death penalty or a long prison sentence, the judge in the case ruled the prosecution could only seek ‘blood money’, according to activists.
The money is compensation for the next of kin under Islamic law.