Sara Sharif’s father admits taping her up and beating her with metal pole – latest

Taking questions from his own lawyer, Urfan Sharif said “didn’t know” when the last time he beat his daughter before hitting her on the Tuesday.

He repeatedly denied beating her over the previous weekend, despite post-mortem evidence showing that she had suffered a traumatic brain injury.

He also denied placing the white pole which he used to strike her in an outbuilding in the garden.

Prosecutor William Emlyn-Jones KC has finished his cross-examination of Urfan Sharif.

His own lawyer Naeem Mian KC is set to ask his client a further set of questions, after his admissions on Wednesday.

Urfan Sharif has denied that Beinash Batool had previously assaulted Sara as she lay dying, before calling him to ask him to return home from his work shift.

“Was the pole already in the room because before you got back, she had already been assaulted by the pole for ‘pretending’ to be ill and you came in and took over as you had done before?,” Mr Emlyn-Jones asked.

“Sara is being disciplined but sometimes the big stick is required so then you get the call, ‘she’s being naughty, she’s your daughter’, is that why the pole was in the room and you beat her while she was dying?”

“I didn’t know she was dying,” he responded.

During this exchange, the prosecutor accused Sharif of looking at Beinash Batool in the dock.

Sara Sharif’s father maintained that he had only beaten his daughter twice with a metal pole on her abdomen on the Tuesday evening while she lay dying, and had not assaulted her in the previous days.

“That weekend she suffered a brain injury from blunt force trauma to her head,” Mr Emlyn Jones KC said. “She had suffered a concusion which was at least 48 hours old, which takes us to Sunday evening and leads us to the weekend.”

“That’s not right sir,” he responded.

He also claimed that he was only inside the property for a few minutes after returning from work before Sara passed away.

“You didn’t do anything to help her did you? Three adults in that house, all with telephones, any one of them could take Sara to the hospital,” the prosecutor said.

He admitted he had lied about Batool insisting they did not contact the emergency services, and said he was “scared” when deciding to flee to Pakistan.

“None of you wanted the police anywhere near the place,” Mr Emlyn-Jones said.

Urfan Sharif has been accused of “manipulating” the evidence in the case, after leaving his phone in Pakistan which could not be examined by police officers.

Reading out one of the few messages available from Sharif to his wife, it read: “Sara cut my laces. You and Sara have made my life. Once she is at home, sort her out before I do.”

“Do you agree that single sentence gives us an insight into Sara’s nightmare existence?”, he was asked. “Yes sir,” he responded.

“It’s the only message we have from you to your wife about Sara because we haven’t got your phones isn’t it?, Mr Emlyn-Jones said. “There would be tons of these wouldn’t there?

“You were discussing it in those messages but when you went to Pakistan you made sure those phones didn’t come and we are denied the treasure trove of what those messages would reveal to us.

“It is another way in which you have manipulated the case to try and make it go to your advantage, get rid of the evidence of those phones, the photos and videos.”

Sharif denied those allegations.

Beinash Batool has been accused of trying to help her husband cover up his violent abuse of Sara, to ensure that he didn’t “get busted”.

Referring to a text message Batool sent her sister in May 2022 which read “He beat her up yesterday. I can’t send her to school looking like that”, the prosecutor claimed they had been conspiring together to maintain the abuse.

“You’re conspiring together aren’t you, to keep your violent treatment a secret from the rest of the world?”, Mr Emlyn-Jones asked. “I was wrong sir,” he responded.

Referring to Sharif’s repeated claims last week that his wife was a “psycho”, the prosecutor said: “It’s very easy to blame Beinash Batool if she was being every bit as bad as you.”

Jurors have been told that Sara was discovered wearing a soiled nappy at the time of her death, despite being 10 years old.

“I’m sure you’ll agree with me 10 year old girls don’t normally need nappies do they,” the prosecutor asked, to which Sharif agreed.

The court had previously heard Sharif claim his wife had told him it was a “normal thing” for young girls to look control of their bowels, to which he responded he had been “selfish”.

“Why wouldn’t she, age 10, jump into the shower or bath? For some reason you had to do it. You had to come home and do it,” the prosecutor questioned – I did a few times sir

“So help us, is that because Sara was restrained and couldn’t get herself to the bathroom? Because she as being kept tied up? That would explain why she would have to wear a nappy?

“She was taped up and then there was a problem that if you leave a little girl taped up, she needs to go to the loo and soils herself, and then you beat her. That is disgraceful isn’t it Mr Sharif? The nappies were a solution to maintaining restraint weren’t they Mr Sharif?”, Mr Emlyn-Jones asked.

Sharif responded “no sir” to the above questions.

Opening questioning by repeating Urfan Sharif’s previous admissions to Batool’s lawyer Caroline Carberry KC, prosecutor William Emlyn-Jones KC asked: “In the last few weeks of Sara’s life, there were occasions she was bound with tape?”

“And then she said bound by you?”

“You are accepting that?”, Mr Emlyn-Jones probed to which Sharif agreed.

The taxi driver denied that the two other defendants assisted him in restraining the schoolgirl.

“You’re taking that one?,” the prosecutor asked. “Yes,” he replied.

He admitted that he had bound his daughter by the hands and wrists and had then beaten her with a pole.

“We have to imagine Sara being restrained by packing tape, if she wasn’t defencless enough against you with a weapon Mr Sharif, and when bound you beat her with the pole yes?”, the prosecutor asked.

“Yes sir,” he admitted while shaking his head.

The trial of Urfan Sharif, Beinash Batool and Faisal Malik has resumed at the Old Bailey.

We’ll be bringing you all the latest updates.

The cross-examination of Urfan Sharif is set to resume once again, with prosecutor William Emlyn-Jones KC to continue questioning.

On Thursday, he called the taxi driver a “coward” as jurors heard that violence was “completely normalised” within their household, as Sara’s father admitted using a cricket bat on his daughter.