SOLVED NY - Tala Farea, 16, Rotana Farea, 22, Hudson River, 24 Oct 2018- COD released: suicide/drowning

Welcome to Websleuths!
Click to learn how to make a missing person's thread

DNA Solves
DNA Solves
DNA Solves

New Posts

LaborDayRN said:
Do we know what type of shelter the girls were in? For example, a women's shelter or a homeless shelter? I know there are organizations that specifically help women that are experiencing the threat of or actual honor violence. I'm wondering if the girls had reached out to such a group, if a shelter would have been found for them.
Click to expand...

When I first read "shelter" I was thinking homeless shelter, but after more information came out, I think it was a shelter to protect them - some kind of women's shelter for abuse victims, for example.
 
Police are looking into the meaning of an apparently troubling trail the sisters left behind.

New York police sent a detective to Virginia to learn more about the sisters' lives there. "Those interviews are really unraveling, in some way, a piece of the puzzle of behind the scenes," Shea said Wednesday. "There is still work to do."

Their mother received a call from the Saudi Embassy in Washington, D.C. ordering the family to leave the U.S. because her daughters had applied for political asylum. Yet an unnamed embassy official said that no such call was made. "Any/All communication with the mother had nothing to do with a supposed asylum claim," the official told the outlet.

If no such call was made, what does the “Any/All communication” refer to. Embassies don’t ring out of the blue for no reason, and if there was nothing untoward, why did the consulate "appointed an attorney to follow the case closely."

N.Y. Police Seeking Answers In Deaths Of Saudi Sisters Found In River
 
TTF14 said:
When I first read "shelter" I was thinking homeless shelter, but after more information came out, I think it was a shelter to protect them - some kind of women's shelter for abuse victims, for example.
Click to expand...
I made the same assumption about the shelter, and I think we're on the right trail now. Still, it's telling that they preferred the shelter to returning home. They did not want to go back to their family. jmo
 
On Wednesday, the medical examiner said the sisters were alive when they entered the water but they have not been able to give further details about the way they died. They refused to give the cause of death and police have not indicated when the examiner is likely to release their report.

NYPD Chief of Detectives said, ' I think we've made significant progress in piecing together pieces of this puzzle to find out what happened' .

In December last year, the pair fled to a shelter in Fairfax. The family reported them both missing. When officers tracked them down, the sisters begged them not to tell the family where they were. What led to them returning home remains a mystery but police are focusing their investigation on the circumstances surrounding it.

Tala had recently been awarded a spot at a top private school in Saudi Arabia with a full scholarship but was desperate not to go. It was the second time they broke off from the family.

Despite their repeated attempts to live independently from their parents, the family was described as 'happy' and were the 'apples of their father's eye'.

The girls only ever used Snapchat, they said, and communicated with their relatives in Saudi Arabia through it.

Saudi sisters found duct taped together were alive when they entered the water | Daily Mail Online
 
Last edited:
Chief of Detectives Shea of the NYPD said investigators have interviewed family members and other people in Virginia this week. “There has been what I will call significant progress trying to get the complete picture of what ultimately led to the two young ladies’ being discovered”.

For now, the situation remains murky, and some public accounts are contradictory. The sisters were reported missing Sept. 12 but were last heard from Aug. 24, Fairfax County police said. Still unclear is why family members waited nearly three weeks to file a missing-person report, but police said neither sister was believed to be in danger at that time.

Fairfax County police said they were previously reported missing on Dec. 1 but were found after a day. Authorities said the sisters were referred to county services but also said privacy rules precluded the release of additional details.

A man who identified himself as a family friend at the Farea home in Virginia said the family was “not in a position to comment” and was unlikely to want to comment in the future.

‘I don’t know where my daughters are’: Odd encounter deepens mystery surrounding disappearance and deaths of Saudi sisters - The Washington Post
 
Re the mother receiving a call from the Saudi Embassy saying the family may have to leave the United States because the sisters had applied for political asylum, a Saudi official said that was inaccurate and that the embassy did not know whether the Farea sisters had applied for asylum.

He said, “The mother’s immigration status was expired. Immigration asked her to leave, and we asked for an extension for her and that is what the conversation was about, not the alleged asylum.”

The Department of Homeland Security said that for privacy reasons it could not comment on whether the sisters had sought asylum.

Johnson, the former neighbor, said the younger sister lived in a Fairfax, Va., apartment with her mother and a brother, who was around 12, and possibly an older second brother. He said he thought Rotana was living elsewhere. [There is an older brother aged 18]

He said the sisters’ father lived in Saudi Arabia and may have worked for the government there. He would visit periodically.

Johnson said that the family moved out over the summer and that he had seen no obvious problems in the household. He said a succession of Saudi exchange students had lived in the apartment before the Fareas.

‘I don’t know where my daughters are’: Odd encounter deepens mystery surrounding disappearance and deaths of Saudi sisters
 
This is so terribly terribly sad. I have strong feelings of fear that these girls must have experienced as they wanted to stay in America, but were likely told they HAD to leave. JMHO

I am on the fence yet regarding suicide vs an honor killing. I think both are possible, but I lean towards the second. They didn't jump from the bridge. So, getting in to the water another way seems like a tough way to commit suicide.
 
cocomod said:
This is so terribly terribly sad. I have strong feelings of fear that these girls must have experienced as they wanted to stay in America, but were likely told they HAD to leave. JMHO

I am on the fence yet regarding suicide vs an honor killing. I think both are possible, but I lean towards the second. They didn't jump from the bridge. So, getting in to the water another way seems like a tough way to commit suicide.
Click to expand...
I agree, though there are piers along the river. It wouldn't be hard at all to walk out on a pier and slide in (or be pushed). The piers I'm thinking are around 131st Street, but there are other piers along the Hudson as well. Being duct-taped ensured they would drown even if not far from the shore.

jmo
 
This is almost one day old, but:

“While we continue the expansive investigation into the deaths of sisters Tala & Rotana Farea—whose bodies were found on Oct 24 at the edge of the Hudson River in Manhattan—we urge anyone w/ info to call CrimeStoppers 800-577-TIPS @NYPDTIPS

Did you know them? Meet them? See them?” (BBM)”
Chief Dermot F. Shea on Twitter
 
Brubeck said:
Anything new in the Times? Also, as a former New Yorker, if you have to trust the tabs, Daily News is far preferable to the Lyin' Post.
Click to expand...
I actually think for local crime stories the Post is usually on point and picks up many more local crime stories vs the NYTs. The DN's also does some solid local crime reporting as well. NYT picks and chooses local crime coverage so doesn't typically follow some of the same cases as the tabloids IMO.
 
OneEye said:
I actually think for local crime stories the Post is usually on point and picks up many more local crime stories vs the NYTs. The DN's also does some solid local crime reporting as well. NYT picks and chooses local crime coverage so doesn't typically follow some of the same cases as the tabloids IMO.
Click to expand...

Idk, the post seems to have caused a lot of confusion with this case (at least for me). I generally don't love the post anyway, but I really dislike their reporting on this one.
 
bears10 said:
Idk, the post seems to have caused a lot of confusion with this case (at least for me). I generally don't love the post anyway, but I really dislike their reporting on this one.
Click to expand...
When it comes to sorting and analyzing, my preferred source is WS. ;) It might take us pages and pages of discussions to get there, but we manage.

Minor mistakes in news coverage is irritating, but what is intolerable is when one single article contradicts itself or muddles the facts when a simple run-through to clean it up would fix that problem. You can tell the articles were pieced together and slapped out quickly - which is a constant disappointment. Readers shouldn't reach the end of the article and say, "Huh?" yet, that's what happens too often.

jmo
 
This disturbing article published in 2010 comments on a study of honor killings in the Muslim world. The statistics are beyond shocking.

Most honor killings are not classified as such, are rarely prosecuted, or when prosecuted in the Muslim world, result in relatively light sentences.

Worldwide, female victims aged 25 years and younger were killed by their families of origin 81 percent of the time. In North America, 94 percent were killed by their family of origin; this figure was 77 percent in Europe and 82 percent in the Muslim world. In North America, fathers had a hands-on role in 100 percent of the cases when the daughter was eighteen-years-old or younger.

It is clear that Muslim girls and women are killed for behaving in accepted Western or modern ways when they express a desire to attend college, have careers, live independent lives, have non-Muslim friends (including boyfriends with whom they may or may not be sexually involved), choose their own husbands, refuse to marry their first cousins, or want to leave an abusive husband.

Worldwide Trends in Honor Killings

Lots more in the article.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

DNASolves

Who is DeKalb County John Doe (2022)?

Members online

... and 116 more.
Total: 1,853 (members: 117, guests: 1,736)

Online statistics

Members online
117
Guests online
1,736
Total visitors
1,853
Totals may include hidden visitors.

Forum statistics

Threads
605,233
Messages
18,184,486
Members
233,279
Latest member
Imabrattoo
Back
Top