Woman describes father stabbing her and her mother after 'many' episodes of abuse

The woman who survived being stabbed by her father after he murdered her mother in a June 2021 attack began her testimony at his trial Thursday, describing the attack and a pattern of domestic violence dating back nearly 15 years.

Hamid Ayoub, 63, is accused of first-degree murder in the stabbing of Hanadi Mohammed, 50, and the attempted murder of his daughter, who was then 22 and is now 26, in Ottawa's Superior Court. He has pleaded not guilty.

The defence concedes that Ayoub murdered Mohammed and stabbed their daughter, but is arguing that the bar for first-degree murder and attempted murder weren't met. The Crown earlier rejected Ayoub's guilty pleas to second-degree murder and aggravated assault.

CBC News has agreed not to name the daughter. She continues to heal mentally and physically, and worries being named in media coverage will harm her mental health. 

Crown prosecutor Louise Tansey began chief examination Thursday morning with questions about the family's history. The survivor, her little brother and Mohammed had moved to Canada from Sudan in 2007 to join Ayoub, who had already arrived.

The violence in Canada started that same year, when the woman was nine and her brother was seven, she told court. By then, she had seen Ayoub hitting Mohammed several times.

Mohammed fled with her children to a shelter after the 2007 abuse. But then the couple reconciled and moved back in together; a pattern that played out repeatedly.

"In the beginning things were OK, and eventually things would just start again.… The abuse," the daughter said, testifying via video link from a different room in the courthouse, with a support person seated next to her off screen.

In Muslim culture divorce is frowned upon, she said. Family, friends and supporters would listen to what was going on, but in the end they would "push the women or the family to just stay together regardless of what's happening."

Her family experienced the same pressure, she said.

Police called in 2012, no action taken

Abuse occurred again in 2009. And in 2012, Ottawa police were called after the children heard hitting sounds followed by Mohammed screaming to the children for help, she testified.

Police arrived, interviewed everyone, then left.

"They didn't do what they needed to do because at the end they just left and nothing changed. Everyone was still in the house after that," the daughter testified.

Abuse occurred again in 2013, before a family trip to Sudan. This time, when Mohammed screamed to the children for help, they ran downstairs and saw their father standing behind her, holding a knife to her throat.

He said, "I'm going to kill you" in Arabic, the daughter testified. This time, police weren't called. She testified she thinks that was because the trip hinged on having signatures from both parents.

Trial not about Ayoub's character, judge tells jury

There was conflict between Ayoub and Mohammed's families during the trip, she told court. Afterward, Mohammed and the children traveled back to Canada separately, and upon their return to Ottawa's airport, Mohammed alerted police and headed to a shelter with the children.

Eventually, they moved back in with Ayoub.

Justice Kevin Phillips instructed the jury not to use the trial to sanction Ayoub for his past behaviour. Instead the trial hinges on whether the Crown proves or doesn't prove that the murder in June 2021 was planned and deliberate or occurred amid criminal harassment.

"This trial is not about what type, what character of man he is. No one stands trial for that," Phillips said.

The attack

The day of the stabbings, the daughter said she was at the door of their home with groceries, just ahead of her mother, when she heard Mohammed screaming. She turned and saw her father stabbing her mother.

The daughter screamed at Ayoub to stop, and tried to pull the knife away by grabbing "the blade itself," injuring her hands.

"And then he just goes on to stabbing me, multiple times," she testified.

"I was just fighting and kicking, just to make everything stop. And when that didn't work I just didn't move and pretended like I was dead. And that's when everything stopped."

Describing the final moments of the attack, she said her voice had stopped working, and that it was "more that I was feeling things than seeing."

Along with the daughter, two of the 12 jurors wept quietly.

Ayoub sat still and expressionless in the box, as he has throughout his trial.

Defence begins cross-examination

Cross-examination began later in the afternoon by defence lawyer Leo Russomanno.

The daughter testified that after she and her mother moved away from Ayoub in August 2020, the daughter continued to have contact with him, at her mother's urging, until Ayoub confronted her mother near her home a month before the stabbings.

After a family meeting at the Rideau Centre in fall 2020, she had been sending him money, helping out around his house after he was injured in a car accident, and posting updates he could see in an online family group chat.

In keeping with cross-examination of earlier Crown witnesses, the defence continued to poke holes in the Crown's theory that a bag Ayoub was arrested with containing thousands of U.S. and Canadian dollars was a getaway bag.

She testified that the family would bring U.S. cash to Sudan on trips, and had earlier testified that Ayoub wanted to take the children on a trip to Sudan at the time of the attack. 

She also testified that she didn't remember her father wearing a mask during the stabbings, and that they had parked in a relatively quiet lot behind their unit, close by and above-ground, before the attack.

Cross-examination continues Friday.