DOHA: The prosecution has urged an appeals court hearing a sensational murder case of a British woman teacher to uphold a lower court’s verdict sentencing the main accused to death for committing the heinous crime.
The lower criminal court had also sentenced an accomplice of the main accused to three years in jail. Both the accused are Qatari nationals. Lauren Patterson (pictured) was murdered in cold blood after being sexually abused in October last year, the prosecution told the court.
It said the accused deserved no mercy even as a lawyer for the victim’s family representing the civil side of the case demanded QR20m ($5.5m) in compensation for her killing.
The prosecution said the murder of the young woman came in as a rude shock to the conservative Qatari society.
The victim came to this country with faith in its society about her well-being and safety, but that was breached by the perpetrators of the crime, so the death sentence given to the main accused should not be commuted at any cost, said the prosecution.
Local Arabic daily Al Raya reported yesterday that the prosecution gave in the court hair-raising details of the crime during a hearing on Sunday.
Her being in a drunken state was exploited by the accused and she was sexually abused before being stabbed in the chest twice.
According to the prosecution, a woman friend of Patterson’s confirmed that she had left a restaurant in a hotel at 3.30am with the main accused and his friend on the ill-fated day. “Patterson was drunk but in control of herself,” said the friend. The prosecution said during interrogation that the main accused admitted he drove her home that morning.
According to the main accused, after the murder, he went upstairs and changed his clothes and later asked his friend for car keys.
“I, then, wrapped Patterson’s body in a blanket and put it in the back of the car. It was 7am.”
“I then drove up to Umm Salal petrol station. Here, I bought a bottle of water and emptied it and asked a fuel station staffer to fill it up with petrol.”
“I came back to my friend’s house. He was waiting for me. I told him what had happened.”
The main accused then told his friend (the second accused) that he had brought petrol and was planning to burn Patterson’s body. This was to be done since it would be known from the medical report that the victim was sexually assaulted before being put to death, the main accused told his friend, said Al Raya.
“We, then, drove to Al Wakra. On the way, from a supermarket we bought four bags of charcoal and a digging tool. We went to Al Kharrara Road where there are lots of abandoned houses. We went into one of the houses, dug up the surface, put the body of the victim in and poured charcoal and petrol on it and put it on fire.”
Al Raya said that Patterson’s mother and a representative of the British embassy in Doha were present at Sunday’s court hearing.
The duo was caught as they went back to the spot of the crime (where they had burnt the victim’s body) for a follow-up check as the police kept vigil there.
The Peninsula
