Sara Sharif police found 'strange' items when they searched family home after finding body

The Old Bailey heard that police officers searching the Sharif house in Woking, Surrey found “strange-looking objects” in wheelie bins outside as well as "homemade hoods"

Sara Sharif was bound, hooded and beaten with a cricket bat and a belt before she died, a court has heard.

A murder trial held at the Old Bailey addressing the 10-year-old's shock death in August 2023 heard that her stepmother, Beinash Batool, allegedly bought 18 rolls of parcel tape online within nine days, jurors were told. Police searching the Sharif house in Woking, Surrey, found “strange-looking objects” in the wheelie bins that were “plastic bags wrapped up with parcel tape”.

Prosecutor William Emlyn Jones KC said some of the items had traces of Sara’s blood on, and that it is "obvious" what they were. He continued: "The prosecution suggest that it is in fact obvious what these items were. They are homemade hoods. They had been placed over Sara’s head, we suggest, and then taped in place."

Suspected makeshift weapons found at the address included a cricket bat with Sara's blood on it, a belt buckle and two rolling pins, the court heard. The Old Bailey also heard messages Batool sent to family members in which she claimed Sara was being abused. Mr Emlyn Jones said: "As a minimum, it shows that Sara was being hurt and injured as long ago as spring of 2021 – so that is more than two years before her death – and that Beinash Batool was aware; and even on her version of events, she didn’t stop it."

The trial heard that fingerprints allegedly belonging to her father, Urfan Sharif, were found on one of the bags that was tested by forensics and on the non-adhesive side of a bit of parcel tape. Sara's stepmother told other family members that her husband was abusing her, saying that if “something happens to Sara I will not be able to forgive myself”.

After her death, she was found to have 10 fractures to her spine and breaks to her right collarbone, two ribs, both shoulder blades, both arms and hands and three fingers, a jury heard. There also appeared to be five bite marks on her left arm, one on her inner thigh and a burn mark from an iron on her buttocks.

Sara's father, minicab driver Urfan Sharif, 42, fled the country with his family on August 10 last year, leaving behind Sara's lifeless body in the family home in Woking, Surrey. Sharif, Sara's stepmother Beinash Batool, 30, and uncle Faisal Malik, 28, all deny murder and causing or allowing the death of a child between December 16, 2022 and August 9, 2023.

The trial continues.