Dead teen’s mum finds justice but not peace

For one grieving Emirati mother no amount of money would compensate for the lost of her son. Not even Dh40 million.

ABU DHABI // Could you put a price on forgiveness? How much would you accept to see the person who killed your loved one spared a death sentence?

For one grieving Emirati mother, no amount of money could compensate for the loss of her son – not even Dh40 million.

Her son was killed more than six years ago when he was 17. He was shot in the back of the head by a classmate, who later stuffed the body in the trunk of a car to bury him in the desert.

“It’s been six years, but in our home it feels like we lost him yesterday,” said the victim’s eldest sister.

“Mum continues to call out his name. The nightmares have not stopped and sometimes she forgets and walks into his room to tell him something, then ­remembers he is no longer there and starts wailing.”

She said her mother’s grief was an open wound that would ­never heal. “When will she forget?” she said, adding that her mother ­refused to wear clothes that were not black in colour and remained in mourning.

The killer was sentenced to death by Abu Dhabi Criminal Court. But months before his execution his family pleaded for a pardon. They offered Dh40 million to the victim’s family as compensation. But the family refused and the killer was put to death by firing squad in 2011.

“It was never about the money,” said the victim’s mother, adding that she feared someone might take revenge for her son’s death. “I needed it to stop.”

But the execution of her son’s killer did not bring peace to the mother or her daughters.

“He’s gone and nothing will bring him back,” she said.

Emirati A R, whose brother was given a death sentence last year for beating a middle-aged Emirati man to death in a road-rage incident, said the victim’s family had demanded Dh10 million in exchange for a pardon.

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