Ali Mahwood-Awad Irsan And The 'Honor Killings' Of Two Young People In Texas

Though Coty Beavers and Gelareh Bagherzadeh were murdered, Nesreen Irsan's life was spared — but just barely. Reportedly accompanied by his father, Ali Mahwood-Awad (pictured), and mother, Alrawabdeh, Nesreen's brother, Nasim shot and killed Bagherzadeh in her car outside her family home. Some months later, Beavers was shot and killed inside the apartment he shared with Nesreen. Her father, Ali Mahwood-Awad, reportedly pulled the trigger. In a plea agreement, Alrawabdeh testified against her husband and son, as NBC News writes. According to Alrawabdeh, Ali Mahwood-Awad also intended to kill his daughter.

At her father's trial, Nesreen outlined in her testimony the fear and abused the Irsan family endured from Ali Mahwood-Awad, an ultra-conservative Muslim. According to the Associated Press (AP), Nesreen said in her testimony, her father told her, "If you have boyfriends, I'm going to kill you ... I'm going to put a bullet between your eyes and his eyes." She was also forced to wear the traditional Muslim head-covering for women called a hijab and forbidden from spending time alone with men outside her family. The murders of Beavers and Bagherzadeh were not the first time that the Irsan patriarch wielded violence  to terrify and oppress his family, the AP writes.

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