Sara Sharif's father tells court he takes 'full responsibility' for daughter's death

Sara Sharif's father told a court yesterday that he took "full responsibility" for the 10-year-old's death and admitted striking her across the abdomen with a metal pole as she lay dying.

- Emine Sinmaz

Urfan Sharif also admitted strangling Sara and beating her with a cricket bat while her ankles and wrists were bound with packing tape in the weeks before she was killed. Sharif told jurors at the Old Bailey that he accepted everything that he had told police in a 999 call and a handwritten confession after his daughter's death.

During cross-examination by Caroline Carberry KC, the barrister for his wife, Beinash Batool, he was asked: "Did you kill your daughter by beating?" He replied: "Yes, she died because of me."

He admitted he had beaten Sara "severely" over a number of weeks because he was angry the schoolgirl had started soiling herself and vomiting.

Sharif, 42, Batool, 30, and Sharif's brother Faisal Malik, 29, are on trial accused of carrying out a violent "campaign of abuse" before Sara was found dead in a bunk bed at the family home in Surrey on 10 August 2023.

The defendants allegedly killed Sara on 8 August before fleeing to Pakistan, from where Sharif called police to say he had "beat her up too much". He had left a handwritten "confession" near her fully clothed body saying: "I swear to God that my intention was not to kill her. But I lost it."

A postmortem examination found Sara had fractures and 71 external injuries, including burns and human bite marks. Sharif had repeatedly denied responsibility for Sara's death as he gave evidence at the Old Bailey. But as he was to be cross-examined for the third day, he said: "I want to say something."