An Ohio teenager who ran away after she became fearful that her Muslim family would harm her for converting to Christianity has won the first round of her Court battle:
A judge today ordered a 17-year-old girl, who ran away from her Muslim family, to stay exactly where she is — here — until the Florida Department of Law Enforcement can find out whether her home is safe.
Moments earlier, Fathima Rifqa Bary , now a Christian, told Circuit Judge Daniel Dawson she wanted to visit her brothers but not her parents.
All five were in court today — her father in a business suit, her mother in a long dress with her head covered by a scarf. Through their lawyers, her parents asked that she be sent back to Ohio.
They had agreed to let her move into a foster home there.
But Rifqa’s lawyer told the judge today that that’s not what she wants. She wants to stay here and practice Christianity with her foster family until she turns 18, said attorney John Stemberger, a conservative Christian activist and leader of Family Policy Council.
She loves Jesus now, she told the judge, and wants to be free to worship without fear of being beaten and killed.
Her father, she said earlier, had threatened to kill her for converting to Christianity.
Today, her father, Mohamed Bary, a jeweler, told the judge that he just wants his daughter home and that she would be free to practice any religion she chooses.
Here’s a video interview of Fathima:
I find it so sick that a father would be willing to kill his own daughter because she wants to believe a different lie than him. Sick.