A schoolgirl has described the moment her parents allegedly tried to strangle her in an ‘honor killing’ after she ran away to escape a forced marriage.
Ihsan Ali, 44, and his wife Zahraa Subhi Mohsin Ali, 40, are charged with second-degree attempted murder and attempted kidnapping after the attack on October 18.
The girl, 17, who can’t be named, ran away from home to Timberline High School in Lacey, Washington, after her parents tried to put her on a plane to Iraq.
‘Her father had recently been threatening her with honor killing for refusing an arranged marriage with an older man in another county,’ the girl told police.
Shocking video showed Ihsan on the ground with his daughter in a chokehold outside the school, while classmates desperately tried to free her.
Ihsan and Zahraa both pleaded not guilty and are expected to go on trial in July.
The girl told police in a three-hour interview with police on October 24 she was terrified of being taken to Iraq where she would be married off, abused, and forced to have children – never to return home.
She went to Iraq when she was 16 to visit extended family, but was repulsed by ‘how they treated women’ compared to her life in the US.
Ihsan Ali, 44, allegedly tried to strangle his daughter in an ‘honor killing’ outside her school and was charged with attempted murder
‘If she went outside, she had to be completely covered and the men would still look at the women. She described it as “disgusting”,’ Detective Julie Mullen wrote in a report obtained by the Daily Mail.
Zahraa stayed behind in Iraq another three months, and when she returned, the girl was dismayed to be told they had bought a house there and would all be moving back.
‘She said her fear of going to Iraq was not returning (to the US), getting abused and that her family might try to kill her,’ police wrote.
‘She also concerned that someone would try to “get with her”, beat her and try to have kids with her.’
Whether the planned move was abandoned or was merely a longer-term plan was unclear, and the girl began dating an American boy in early 2024.
After Ihsan discovered the relationship, he pulled her out of school and bought most of the family plane tickets to Iraq for an arranged marriage.
The girl told police she made her family think she would go, but was secretly planning her escape – only allowing them to pack clothes she didn’t want to keep.
She awoke at 4am on the day of the flight and was able to sneak out by 6am after her sister went back to bed.
Ihsan in police bodycam footage sitting a patrol car. His jacket was torn in the struggle and dirt pressed into one side of his face during the attack
Shocking video allegedly showed Ihsan Ali, 44, on the ground with his daughter in a chokehold, while classmates desperately tried to free her
By 6.12am she was on the bus and waited at Safeway and Walmart until Timberline opened at 7am, dodging her parents as they drove around looking for her.
Eventually she made it to the school and was kept in an office while staff worked out a plan for her to stay at a women’s refuge.
However, the school did not arrange transport for her, so she went out the front with her 16-year-old boyfriend to catch a bus.
That’s when she spotted Ihsan’s truck in the car park and ‘started panicking and her heart was racing’. Suddenly, he was in front of her.
At first he was calm, quiet, and smiling, telling her she needed to come home. Having allegedly suffered horrific abuse at his hands, she didn’t fall for it.
‘[The girl] said that was not like her dad and she felt if she went home, she was going to be beat or they were going to make fun of her,’ police wrote.
She told police her father said ‘Heron’ in Arabic, which meant, ‘It’s not right, you’re not supposed to be doing this’.
The boyfriend put a protective hand on her back as she confronted her father, but this only enraged Ihsan more.
Ishan’s eldest daughter Haneen, 21, and wife Zahraa Subhi Mohsin Ali, 40, were also involved in the attack. Zahraa was also charged with attempted murder but Haneen is not charged with a crime
Just as the bus arrived, and while other students were recording the scene on their phones, Ihsan allegedly punched him in the head.
With the boyfriend knocked to the floor with his eyes closed, Ihsan grabbed his daughter in a viscous attack.
‘[The girl] said her dad yanked her down and put her in a headlock. She said he was “choking” her “really hard” and she remembered grabbing his arm but then passed out,’ police wrote.
From there, her memory of Ihsan’s attack ended, and she only knew what happened by watching the video of her boyfriend and classmates heroically saving her life.
But the attempt on her life was not over, as Zahraa allegedly seized her and tried to finish the ‘honor killing’.
‘[The girl] said she also recalled someone else grabbing her but she didn’t know it was her mom at first,’ police wrote in the report.
‘Someone pushed them to the ground, and then her mom started to choke her and was screaming in her ear.
‘Her mom wasn’t choking her that hard and she was trying to tell her mom she was choking her but she couldn’t say anything.’
Haneen, 21, is accused of trying to fend off her younger sister’s classmates so Zahraa could allegedly choke the girl to death in the ‘honor killing’. Haneen has not been charged
By the time police arrived, the girl’s brave 16-year-old boyfriend and his classmates had fought off Ihsan, saving her life, and adult passerby Josh Wagner restrained him on the ground
The girl then described how her eldest sister Haneen, 21, who is not charged with a crime, allegedly tried to fight off students trying to stop Zahraa.
As she tried to get to her feet, she said Haneen was yelling at her boyfriend not to touch Zahraa or herself.
‘[The girl] said she got up and Haneen was grabbing onto her and when she let go she and ran and she was screaming,’ police wrote.
The girl and her boyfriend ran inside the school with Zahraa in hot pursuit, but her mother was prevented from entering out and the campus put on lockdown.
‘She explained her neck felt heated, it hurt badly, her throat was sore, she was in pain, had scratches on her neck, dirt on her hands and leaves in her hair,’ police wrote.
‘[The girl] said said the scariest part was blacking out because she didn’t know if she was going to wake up again.
‘She also said she “never thought he would hit me or choke me”.’
The girl told police she feared being abused and killed if she got on the plane to Iraq with her family, which was why she fled.
Police bodycam footage showed officers arriving at the school and arresting Ihsan, who demanded to speak to his daughter
‘Men think they can control women and the women can’t do anything about it,’ police wrote that she told them.
‘[She] explained forced marriage is a part of their religion and her parents were in a forced marriage and they are cousins.
‘She said for “us” (women) if she had sex with more than one person “she dies” but men are treated differently and she explained they can have more than one sexual partner.’
The girl also detailed her father’s alleged threats to kill her for dating an American boy, and refusing an arranged marriage.
She said his threats escalated after the September 15 incident and an altercation outside the school between her boyfriend and Zahraa the next day.
Ihsan was so furious he pulled her out of school for the weeks until the October 18 attack.
‘If I could kill you, I would kill you, but I can’t do that. I can’t do that because there’s cops and CPS people involved right now because of you,’ she claimed he said.
‘And I can’t touch you because you will immediately go to the school.’
The girl told police Ihsan another time told her he wanted to ‘hurt her so badly but there are cops here’ but also told her how he would ‘kill her no matter what happens’ and he ‘did not care if anyone saw him’.
‘[The girl] said the reason why her father threatened to kill her [was] because she has made ‘trouble at home’ and he believes she is trying to ‘separate the family’,’ the report alleged.
She said one time her dad caught her using a cell phone and dragged her by the hair, which caused her to ‘hit the wall’ and hurt her knee.
Police bodycam footage obtained by the Daily Mail showed officers arriving at the school and arresting Ihsan, who demanded to speak to his daughter.
‘Just let me tell her to come home – not like that. If I tell her to go home, she will go home,’ he insisted, but police ignored him.
Officers then had to deal with Zahraa and Haneen, who were hysterical and only left after Zahraa was allowed to speak to Ihsan.
Police did not realize Zahraa also allegedly tried to kill her daughter until four days later, leaving her free to continue looking for her daughter, who was in hiding.
Zahraa drove her youngest children, two boys aged five and three, into Canada and dropped them off with an Ihsan’s brother and mother, who lived there.
The girl (pictured) spent four days in St Peter Hospital for treatment after a strangulation exam, having complained of neck, throat, and jaw pain, and had difficulty swallowing
These are some of the cuts, welts, and broken bones the teenage girl suffered when her parents allegedly tried to strangle her in an ‘honor killing’
She then returned to Washington before trying to cross into Canada a second time with a ‘notable quantity of baggage’ on the night of October 22, but was arrested by customs officers.
The boyfriend suffered a boxer’s fracture as he tried to get Ishan off his girlfriend, and bruises and scratches on his head and face.
The girl spent four days in St Peter Hospital for treatment after a strangulation exam, having complained of neck, throat, and jaw pain, and had difficulty swallowing.
Hospital staff listed her injuries as including redness and abrasions to her face, head, shoulders, neck, scalp, and under her chin.
She also had suffered burst blood vessels in her eyes and an eyelid droop.
‘She believes she lost consciousness three to four times during the incident,’ court documents alleged, adding that at one point she woke up with dirt pressed into her face.
‘[The girl] stated that she thought she was going to die.’
Victor Barnes, the boyfriend’s father, explained that his son started dating the girl in February 2024, and her family kept it a secret from Ihsan, who was often out of town running his business.
The girl’s 16-year-old boyfriend in the clothes he was wearing during the attack
‘He’s an abusive man. So they just didn’t tell him because… they may think he’ll fly off the handle and do something crazy like he did,’ he said.
Ihsan was not initially charged with attempted murder, and released from jail on October 24 on just a $150,000 bond after a hearing in Thurston County Superior Court before Judge John Skinder.
Zahraa faced a different judge – Christopher Lanese – on the same day, but she was charged with attempted murder and held on $500,000 bail.
Almost two weeks after his release, on November 5, second-degree attempted murder was finally added to Ihsan’s charges.
Ihsan was re-arrested and his bail raised to $1million, which was too much for him to pay. He remains in jail, while Zahraa’s bond was unchanged.
