8.26 AM Tuesday, 19 March 2024
  • City Fajr Shuruq Duhr Asr Magrib Isha
  • Dubai 05:07 06:20 12:29 15:54 18:33 19:47
19 March 2024

Two children die after mom locks them in closet

Published
By Staff

Edyan Farah, 28, allegedly put all five of her children for 10 hours - aged one through seven - into the small closet and pushed a bed in front of the door so they could not get out.

Two children died, the Daily Mail reported.

The closet was 6ft long and about 18in deep.

Farah left for ten and a half hours to visit a friend on Sunday. When she came back to her home in Indianaopolis, she opened the closet to find her five-year-old daughter Zuhur and three-year-old son Zakariya 'stiff and unresponsive'.

She told officers she carried them downstairs but did not call for help or try to revive them.

Four hours later, a family friend grew concerned when Farah - who was acting strangely - refused to let anyone in the apartment.

The friend then called Farah's uncle to the apartment complex. When he arrived and looked through the door of the apartment, he saw what appeared to be a dead child on the couch.

When he tried to call 911, Farah grabbed his phone from his hands and threw it away.

He then held her down as the family friend retrieved the phone and called for help.

Now Farah has been charged with neglect resulting in her children's deaths.

She told police she was 'not in her right mind' at the time of the incident.

An autopsy has not indicated how the two children died.

Police and neighbours said the children appeared malnourished - but the coroner said that while the two children were thin, she did not consider them emaciated.

Hussein Adam, a cousin of the children's father, said Monday that the family had emigrated from Somalia about a decade ago. He said Farah's husband had returned there several weeks ago to visit his parents, but was en route back to the US.

Lt Jeff Duhamell said the three surviving children - a seven-year-old girl and boys ages five and one - are now in foster care. 'It's just a very, very sad case,' he said.

'It's one of the worst ones I've seen - to be placed in a closet approximately 18in by 6ft and a bed pushed up against it for a minimum of ten hours. We think possibly a lot longer and probably not for the first time.'

Farah is due to appear in court today.