Introducing Sahra

Fartumo Kusow: Welcome to Break the Silence, Build the Future. I'm your host, Fartu Makuso. This is episode two. Last week I told you about what I expected from this process and what it actually was and what it became. I opened this season that way on purpose because before you meet Zahra through a trial, through evidence, through a verdict, I wanted you to know that this is a mother telling you about her daughter. It's not a case number, a person. So today is her day, is her episode. Zahra was the eldest of my five children. She was the one who made me a mother. That week, she had just started a new job. She started on Monday and went missing Friday. It was the kind of job where you had to dress in a business casual. And she hadn't had steady work in months before that. Her situation was so chaotic. So she called me. weekend before. Mom, I have to dress like business now. Can you help me get some stuff? So we went to the mall together. Dress pants, tops, and then she found boots, two pairs, same style, different colors, and she wanted both. I said, why do you need two of the same shoe? She said, I love them, mom, I just want to have them. I teased her about that. I told her a grown woman doesn't want two pairs of the same boot. And she just laughed and said, let me be my teenage self. That was Zahra, playful, a little stubborn about the things she loved, and completely unbothered by being teased for it. When she left. the relationship, we got her a new phone. A clean start. I registered number under my name so she couldn't be tracked. When we picked it out, she chose a phone case that was almost aggressively bright pink. I laughed and told her it looked like something a teenager would pick. She just grinned. She had this way of being even in the middle of the hard year she had. Zahra was very kind. She would always compliment on other people. And she complimented on without mentioning a physical appearance of the person. She would say, I love how your hair is braided. Or she would say, I love that necklace. It looks beautiful on you. When we went to the grocery store, she would look at the name tag of the person checking us out and she will make sure when we left, she would use their name. Have a good day, Jennifer. Have an excellent rest of your week, Susan. That's Zahra. She would make sure she accounted for other people. So... When Zahra went missing, she was staying at a battered woman's shelter. This was a part of building a life apart from him. I remember she checked herself on the shelter on May the 8th, which was my birthday. From that day on, my birthday is always tinged with this hope that turned tragic. She had called me. And I was encouraging her, she needs to go. She needs to get out of this relationship. She needs to stop this spiraling, this connection with this person. I was telling her she needs to get herself in a safe place. And then she had called me. She said, mom, I am in a cab on my way to the shelter. And in the middle of her telling me, that she had decided to go in the shelter, she realized that was my birthday. And then she said, maybe I'll come home and be with you for your birthday and go tomorrow. And I said, no, please go, because this is the best birthday gift you could ever give me. And she went, May the 8th. That was the greatest gift, because I thought now, her going to a battered woman's shelter is the signal of her saying, I am done, I'll be out of it. So she stayed there. And that weekend, the weekend of May 26th, that weekend, she was given a weekend pass and she was due back on the shelter Sunday night. I'm finding all this out. After the fact, I didn't know at the time. The last time I spoke to my daughter was that Friday. She had called me 6-12. I remember it as though it was yesterday, even though it's been over three years now. She'd called me 6-12. She was so happy. She had worked for that week. She loved to be where she worked with. and she loved being there. She felt like she was heading in a better place with her life. We talked for 12 minutes. We talked about all these dreams, her leaving the city, moving to Toronto, looking for work or asking this company to transfer. And then I said, all that is fantastic. I'll support you. You can be with your sister for a bit until you get a job. You don't even have to wait here to get a job. You can be there and get a job. And then she said, let us get together for dinner on Monday and we could talk about it and finalize things. At 6 24 12 minutes after she called me, she said, mom, I'm here in front of the shelter. I'll see you Monday. And that was it. I love you, mom. See you Monday. That was the last thing she ever. said to me the Monday we were supposed to meet Monday was supposed to finalize for her finally leaving the entire area and getting out that Monday never came it never arrived and as we saw on the video that came in the trial that evening a car pulled us up for her outside the shelter sometime around 7 30 You could see her. There's no audio. You only see the video. You could see her get into the back seat. Later I learned the ride had been arranged by using his phone number and his credit card, not hers. It dropped her off at a motel a few minutes later called Best Way Motel in Huron Church, little before 740. On a security footage you could see her walking up, two bags on her shoulder, her holding her phone, that bright big case visible in her hand. You could see her steps so light, so joyful, even though there's no audio. She walks up the stairs. Second floor, a room. A door opens and she goes in. That is the last time anyone sees her anywhere. I see her walk into that hotel room. Even though I know as I'm sitting in that cold, uncaring courthouse that she's not going to walk out of that room. All I wanted to do was to jump. through that screen and grab her back, her not to go in, stop going, turn around, get back into the car and go back to the shelter. She never came back out on camera again. I want to be very deliberate about where I'm stopping today. You will hear more in time about what the trial uncovered. But today I wanted you to have her walking up those stairs holding a phone in a pink case she picked out for herself a year and a earlier. A new job. Trying to build something apart from him. I wanted you to meet Zahro before this season takes you into a courtroom. Before everything that follows, the witnesses, the evidence, all of it, it's in service of a daughter, a person who was loved and dismissed. Next week, we step into episode three with a gasped conversation, Sophie Khan, and strategic silence and the thesis of this whole season. that silence is not protection. Silence is permission. Then in episode 4 we go back into the child's If today's episode brought something up for you, if you are in immediate danger, please call 911. If you are in Ontario, the Assaulted Women's Helpline is free, confidential, and open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in more than 200 languages. Please call 1-866-863. 0511. For French language support, please call 1-877-336-2433. To find the anywhere in Canada, search Shelter Safe. That is S-H-E-L-T-E-R-S-A-F-E. and you can always find us at zahrabullefoundation.ca. Everything we talked about, the numbers, the information, all of those will be in the show notes. Thank you for meeting Zahra with me today. Find more information from today's episode in the show notes. or at zahraboulehfoundation.ca slash podcast. Subscribe and follow the show wherever you get your podcast. Please leave a review. It goes a long way. Next week, please join us as I sit with Sophie Khan to talk about strategic silence. I am Fartu Makusel and this has been Break the Silence, Build the Future.