Killed Because They Were Girls

On the night of June 30, 2009, a father, mother and brother drowned half their family in a black Nissan just outside of Kingston, Ontario. On January 29, 2012, Mohammad Shafia, Tooba Mohammad Yahya and Hamed Mohammad Shafia were each convicted of four counts of first-degree murder. The apparent motive behind the killings was what the judge ultimately described as "a notion of honour that is founded in the domination and control of women, a sick notion of honour that has absolutely no place in any civilized society." Christie Blatchford and the reporters and columnists of the National Post covered the so-called honour killings from the first reports of a submerged car to the final verdict. With her clear analysis and astute emotional observation, Blatchford provides the definitive account of a crime that appalled a nation.