Their father believed in arranged marriage - and he was willing to end their lives for it

the saeed sisters apparently became the innocent victims of a tragic culture clash she's mine the fatal collision of the old-world tradition of arranged marriage and they would go to the highest bidder yes and the ill-fated young love of a modern-day Romeo and Juliet we both felt like what we had was very real and it was very very much worth fighting for and to her it was worth dying for now Crimewatch Daly has obtained exclusive access to a vault of chilling home videos and other evidence shedding new light on the murders of Amina and Sarah Saeed and it's being seen for the first time here on TV we believe that we put pressure on law enforcement to create some more activity on on the case the material was uncovered during the making of a documentary titled the price of honor and the filmmakers agreed to share it with crime watch daily to aid in our own investigation of this horrifying and heartbreaking case it was really hard to understand that a father would put their daughters through something like that who that's that Ameena and her little sister Sarah always seemed like much loved well-adjusted girls with an older brother named Islam Sarah was more of the tomboy really reserved I mean it was more of a social butterfly she was very outspoken she was very tomboy - but she had also had that pretty cheek side to her the two girls grew up together as best friends and playmates with the same interests as most other children - computers Sarah and Amina were well-mannered pretty smart and popular at school where they were diligent model students they had plans for themselves you know that both Amina and Sarah definitely had future plans Sarah didn't really talk too much she was very academic that's all she really ever talked about that she was always talking about school Amina also had high academic ambitions she wanted to go to college I can't recall which doctor it is but she wanted to be a doctor but they also realized from an early age that they'd been born into a strained and troubled union of two very different worlds growing up American in Bedford Texas near Dallas the home of their Southern Baptist mother Patricia but raised in the traditions of old Egypt the homeland of their Muslim father Yasser oh no they were Priam appropriated they really buckle down on them girls and the girls had to walk blood so did mom who was only 15 when she married Yasser 29 14 years her senior I couldn't believe it I was like you're kidding when I found out she was getting married I had a little tantrum you know you know I told her well you're running your life you're too young but even though she was legally underage Patricia wasn't too young by yasser standards and she and her father eventually agreed to the marriage I don't think it was love I think it was just we were so poor I just wanted to get out of the house you know he like promised everything know everything you know your life is gonna be better he had a lot of land he had a little bit of stuff in Egypt yes sir had convinced my dad that that he loved my sister and that his family had a lot of money and they could take care of my sister and treat her with respect and for a short while he did at first it was good he was loving six or seven months maybe a year I just started going downhill Yaser a taxi driver reportedly wasn't living up to his promises Patricia was she worked all the time you know she'd worked most of the time because he wouldn't hurt her work and Yasser was revealing himself to be a tyrant he just like started wanting to have more control did not want me to have anything to do with my family those Americans and the Americans who isn't very good you know we were Americans and we're attracted to them and they were that you were what to them like what charge or trash Yaser wasn't fond of anything American including his own wife eventually yes II would just say it was a mistake and he married American Patricia says he also became physically abusive that was sleeping and he come in from work he'd come in I kicked the bottom of my feet or heavy to get me up he would take stuff from the dresser drawers then go pour it all out in the middle of the floor and then make me sit there and clean it all up he cut me on my leg because I wouldn't have it of course with him Patricia says she caught yasser cheating on her too he had six affairs and I know of he also had her pose for sick pictures like these holding a gun and him with a knife at her throat but Patricia put up with it she'd leave him for a day or two she would think it was funny like she was teaching him a lesson and it's alleged yasser would not only continue to abuse patricia but also their daughters Amina and Sarah in the worst way possible they told their grandmother Patricius mother that yes sir had been messing with them absolutely chilling I won't don't worry I know scared Yasser Sayid rolls the camera as daughter Amina eerily points his gun at him perhaps the very same weapon he would allegedly soon use to shoot Amina and her sister Sarah to death in a taxi and maybe also the same gun their aunt Jill says yasser used to terrify intimidate and threaten the teenagers when he would fly into wild fits of rage he would wake them girls up in the middle of the night waving a gun threatening them that they were gonna do what he says or he was killing them Amina reportedly told friends and family members her father also physically abused them just as he allegedly abused their mother Patricia you know he used to beat the girls he had baked the girls Ameena sent emails to friends detailing what her father did to her claiming he kicked me in the stomach kicked me in the face with his boots tells me to sit up [ __ ] she would tell me more and more just the horror stories about him basically but none more sickening than the allegation that yasser abused his daughters in the worst way imaginable when Amina was just nine and Sarah eight they told their grandmother Patricius mother that yes sir had been messing with them and by that by that you mean sexually abusing him yes mom patricia moved out with the kids and reported the incident to the police they talked to Amina they talked to Sarah here to get the transcript and read it you'd be shocked at what these little girls said that he did to him we did in fact read the police report and yes the girls actually accused their father of raping them do you believe that the girls were telling the truth yesterday but then Amina and Sarah suddenly recanted their story and that was investigated by the hill County Sheriff's Office and the charges were later dropped by them but the kids aunt Jill claims Amina told family members that her mom and dad forced them to say they'd made it up yes sir in her made the kids recant their story and say that it didn't happen to keep him out of jail it could be that they you know they felt pressured or they were scared and didn't want to see that parent get in trouble now yasser was free to allegedly continue abusing his daughters well into their teens but that's for a record bashing people see how you sleep with your clothes [Music] this home video yasser shot in his daughter's bedroom is just plain creepy [Applause] [Music] [Music] do you think that those videotapes support the possibility that they were sexually abused definitely the footage supports the fact that it was very abusive to them there were no more allegations of sexual abuse but these interactions yasser videotaped with Sarah and Amina appear to have some troubling sexual overtones that obviously made his daughters but yasser reportedly didn't want any other men looking at his daughters without his approval he believed in arranged marriages and didn't like the girls having boyfriends in fact Jill says yasser was already trying to find them husbands in his own homeland he took Amina when she was 16 to Egypt I tried to marry her 47 year old Miami and Amina said no but Ruth Trotter the mother boyfriend Joseph who Amina kept secret from her father says yasser wouldn't take no for an answer she told my son that her father had plans for both girls once they graduated to be in a forced marriage and that's why they were going to Egypt during the summers because he was introducing her to men that I guess potential suitors and they would go to the highest bidder yes Amina and Sarah were horrified you know there were American girls they wanted to blow food where they wanted to live and enjoy the freedom that was afforded to their older brother Islam yes sir I treated Islam a lot different from what I've been told the boys in the Muslim family are very respected that's why they believe that guys can do what they won't do he was just always so different from the girls yasser kept constant guard on Amina and Sarah reportedly using cameras and other spying techniques to monitor their every movement it's almost as if he had his daughters under surveillance yes and as they got older I believe that you know kids get older you started to lose a little bit of that control and I don't think he liked that it's alleged yasser had bugged their cars and was getting into their computers and phones he was checking cell phone bills finding numbers on the cell phones he would go back and then he would call those phone numbers to find out if never belonged to a male or female to see who they were talking to and yasser went on high alert after his daughters began working part time at a local store supervisor this is yasser staking out the store with his camera rolling spying on Sarah while Amina is in the car with him she can't see us from inside the night and he becomes enraged she smiles a customer she has a job she loved it how would you describe a father trailing his daughters and videotaping them at work and at school and outside and in the backyard yeah it's creepy yeah it's real creepy and he did it all the time then the asar would make a discovery that cops say would prove fatal for Amina and Sarah our belief is that this is what drove him to ultimately kill them it was more than just puppy love we both felt like what we had was very real and it was very very much worth fighting for Ameena Syed and Joseph Moreno were like Romeo and Juliet sir her it was worth dying for and Amina would die for it along with younger sister Sarah when their father Yasser allegedly shot them both dead in a taxi after learning about Amina's romance with boyfriend Joseph it was hard to say the least Joseph and Amina had fallen in love at first sight when they were both young teenagers in the same martial arts class they're seen here in a home video uncovered during the making of the documentary the price of honour she walked in and I was like man who was that girl and I was almost immediately attracted to her Amina felt the same attraction I would describe it as your stereotypical young teenage love they were together almost every day of the week they didn't take much time for us to start a relationship a serious relationship and went from hey I like you too I love you the young lovers would be bound at the heart for four years we were really in love with each other Joseph's mother Ruth Trotter fully approved of Amina first of all she was strikingly beautiful she had these amazing beautiful green eyes and a smile I mean to know her was just to fall in love with her we used to write like little love notes to each other pretty much every day when we would come to class we would just trade notes with each other you know with during the day at school or whatever we would just write whatever we thought and it became like a daily thing Joseph and Amina were also best friends she was the kind of person that could have had the worst day at school maybe arguing with my mom or something and within a minute of being around here nothing else mattered she just had a very strong presence about her she she was just one of a kind but Amina and Joseph had to keep their romance secret from her father Yasser who had forbidden both his daughters from having American boyfriends she started telling me just little by little that it was more than just him being protective it was more him being controlling and abusive Joseph felt her pain I wanted to get her away from that so bad she was she was such a good person she didn't deserve to live like that the two could never be seen together we had to pick her up in the parking lot of the Taekwondo studio because we couldn't come to her house because her dad was there Joseph's mother says he and Amina had to be very careful early on she started kind of giving instruction to my son you're gonna be in my phone under a different name and didn't they have codes for things yes they did Amina and Joseph had their own language and Amina had a separate phone her father didn't know about that's was for her her safe place to be able to contact my son she was always afraid of her dad finding the phone funding my number Ruth says Amina even sent her a picture of her family members warning her they might be dangerous she said if you ever see any of these people around your house or around you or Joseph you need to be very scared and you need to try to get to the police at the same time Amina and Joseph were talking about eloping I wanted her to be my wife I wanted her to be my queen and we were gonna make it happen one way or another we were gonna go to Vegas and just have a trip and we're gonna get married but that's when Yasir discovered one of their love letters and realized she had a boyfriend she told me that he had found one that she was writing to me and was asking her you know who is this for like you know what the hell is this he went ballistic he was beating Amina oh he's on her mouth like you knowing a snap she was bleeding it was horrible I'm just pretty much was forcing Amina to tell her work where Joseph was but a Meanor refused to betray her boyfriend I mean I wouldn't say anything so you know he kept hitting her because of that I mean I knew if she talking about Joseph he would probably go and kill Joseph yasser was determined Amina would never see Joseph again and within days he had relocated his whole family from their home in Bedford Texas to the town of Louisville 20 miles away she was just going and I hadn't I had no idea like what happened she literally just from all my from talking to her hours a day every day to just nothing she just she was just calling yasser saeed was enraged when he discovered his daughter Amina had a secret boyfriend she got a brutal beating because he wanted all the information on my son and she didn't reveal anything to him yasser was determined Amina would never see her sweetheart Joseph again immediately relocating the whole family from Bedford Texas near Dallas to a new home in Louisville 20 miles away I had no idea like what happened she literally just from my from talking to her two hours a day every day to just nothing she just she was just calling Joseph's mother Ruth says Amina was too afraid to even contact him for the sake of their safety I was concerned because I knew at that point the threat Ferg I mean his life and my son's life was real FileMaker show well Thomas says Amina had long believed her father would eventually kill her I mean I knew she was gonna die she just knew was a matter of time and pammo says Amina became so resigned to it that she'd reportedly even considered committing suicide with her father's own gun there's a read emails where she talks about killing herself where she says next time that he leaves his gun on the washer I'm just gonna use it for what he bought her for which is kill me I'll make it easier for him now after being forcibly separated from the love of her life a scared and heartbroken Amina sent a letter to Joseph SMAW reading I hate it here by heart Jojo and I pray we'll be together again Amina sent another letter to Joseph saying I don't care he'll have to kill me first I'd rather die than live without you one day we'll be married and happy I love you I can't stop crying I love you she also wrote in emails that her father was still determined to sell both her and sister Sarah into an arranged marriage in his native Egypt saying he's gonna take me over there and let some guy choose me like I'm a freaking object I'd give anything to just get to pick my own husband and when Amina finally refused to take part in an arranged marriage her aunt Jill says a furious yasser reportedly threatened to kill both her and Sarah whom he discovered had a secret boyfriend - he had pulled a gun on him that day and he was gonna kill me the sisters finally realized they had to get away from yasser to save their own lives and that's when mina and her sister made the plan that they were gonna go ahead and run away she just didn't want to be under her dad anymore and I heard Sarah basically I had enough and they wanted a chance at a real life so they left and mom Patricia fled with them driving to Tulsa Oklahoma where they leased an apartment to hide out when we left we took our Sims cards out of our cellphones and we broke them in half and Domini the trash the first thing that the father would try to do was try to track him from their cell phones and after they left they got another one from you know some small carrier the first thing Amina did was call the sweetheart she'd been pining for and we started talking again and you know we realized everything that we felt was still there and just because things had gotten a little crazy that there was no reason to give up on it but yasser wasn't giving up either trying to find his runaway wife and daughters through her family he was trying to say that he wanted him to come home but and I told her it's a trick just don't go back just stay away there mom Patricia would make the mistake of calling him and once yo sir had their new number he was relentless leaving voicemails and then sending emails to my phone and I mean I was phone saying that just to go back home it was our house not to leave and Joseph says Amina noticed her mother's resolve weakening she was very worried because her mom was having second thoughts then a fateful decision we agreed on going back to Texas that that was a horrible idea just to stay going I mean if you can't trust your mom and you know what your dad is like what and she told me that she had to do what she had to do Amina and Sarah Syed had to run for their lives fleeing their Lewisville Texas home with mom Patricia to escape their allegedly abusive and violent father yasser he had pulled a gun on him that day and he was going to come and the three were living in Oklahoma where Yasir couldn't find them they basically had enough and they wanted a chance at a real life but now Patricia tells her daughter's she wants them to return to Texas to visit family members over the Christmas and New Year's holiday and Amina and boyfriend Joseph are alarmed I mean it was very scared because I mean she knew what that meant being with an easy and dangerous reach of her father Joseph begged her not to come back he said I mean it you know what's gonna happen but mom Patricia had reportedly reassured her daughter's they wouldn't be staying with yasser amina said that my sister Patricia and and she had told her that she was going to come back and stay at my house and put flowers on my mom's grave for her birthday and Amina reluctantly agrees to go and I remember just telling her no and she told me that she had to do what she had to do it isn't until they arrived back in Louisville that Amina discovers to her horror that her mother has apparently tricked her and Sarah saying she told him I'm going back to your father and that they were going with her prompting a panicked Amina's to send a text message to boyfriend Joseph telling him that she was terrified Sarah went and Amina refused she said I'm never going back I'd rather die before I go back I may know refused to go home she went to her friend's house but yasser begs Amina to at least visit him I mean I talked to yasser and he told her that everything was gonna be okay and Amina agrees to meet him on the first day of the new here and what will turn out to be the last day of her life so I went picked her up from her friend's house and we went home and Yasser tells the girls that he wants to take them out to eat and to talk Amina and Sarah getting into the taxi yasser is driving that evening would be the last time their mother would see them alive police dispatchers get a horrifying 911 call from a frantic Sarah Sarah is being shot as she's calling Sarah can be heard taking her last breath on the call and his cops try to track her location dispatchers get another 911 in a cab parked at a taxi stand outside this hotel cops arrive at the scene to find Amina lying dead from two gunshot wounds and Sarah from nine but there's no driver he's nowhere to be found not only do police have a double homicide on their hands they now believe the killer may be the girl's own father Sarah herself had named him as the gunman on her 911 oh I just can't believe it Sarah after being shot like that good still managed to call no no more and it did identify her killer the officers they they began searching the area they began searching the home any place that they could think of that he might go and as cops continue hunting for Yasir heartbroken friends and family learn of the murders I couldn't believe it I was just shocked I was like you gotta be kidding me how did you sir get the girls how did he get him that was just like bawling-crying cuz I I can't believe it like it was just so surreal of course I didn't believe it for a meanness sweetheart Joseph it's a tragic end to their Romeo and Juliet love story that's really wonder when all the what is all the hope just just I the love of his life was executed and there's they'll never be no anymore Joseph and Amina all the rage in the world could have couldn't reverse it losing Amina leaves Joseph devastated I lost my grip on reality for for more than a little while he was crying 24 hours a day he couldn't eat he couldn't sleep he couldn't drink that I could get out of bed and go brush my teeth was an accomplishment in itself we had to seek help for him medical help nobody can believe a father would kill his own daughters he's a monster nor can their mother's family imagine why she would allow them near yasser after all the abuse and death threats he allegedly already inflicted upon them I don't have no sympathy for any mother that would lie and trick their girls and put them through what she did all their lives do you believe that going back to Texas was a death sentence yes I don't believe that it was it's definitely they know if they ever went back that they would definitely kill him Showell vamos came to the same conclusion while making the documentary the price of Honor did Patricia knowingly bring back those girls into harm according to everybody that I've talked to through the investigation that we did for the documentary yes I said definitely yes but Patricia insists she never imagined yasser would murder their daughters who would think that their father would kill them and detective eric curtis says her judgment may have been affected by the abuse she also allegedly suffered at the hands of her husband it's not uncommon that when a person is a victim of domestic violence that they have a hard time getting away from that abuser and have a hard time protecting their daughters yes detective Curtis blames the murders of Amina and Sarah on a fatal culture clash our indications are that yasser was upset about Amina and Sarah's western lifestyle that they were living and the detective says that finding out first that Amina had an American boyfriend and that Sarah had one too sent egyptian-born yasser over the edge our belief is that this is what drove him to ultimately kill them some say the heinous crime was what is known as an honor killing they said culture belief you know that if you don't honor my name I'm gonna honor my name myself I'm gonna kill you to clean the shame this is a double honor killing this is exactly what they see it what's honorable about this nothing's on a rule die that get is but it's not but detective Curtis alleges it's something else in the day it's just murder I mean he murdered his two daughters now more than eight years later yasser saeed is still on the loose and on the FBI's most wanted list there have been some reported sightings of him but authorities still have no idea of his whereabouts so how badly do you all want to find him very much as do friends and relatives of Amina and Sarah who are still haunted by their shocking murders sometimes I'll wake up in the middle of a night from a nightmare that year sir is coming down my hallway with guns and every New Year's Day marks another anniversary of the killings a heartbreaking reminder of Amina and Joseph tragic romeo and juliet' romance when it's the person that means more than anything in the world to you I mean how do you do it's just so emotional we miss her so much we want her manic and Yasir captured and tried for the murders of his daughters here's the last picture of saeed and an age progression photo of him investigators say he always wears dark sunglasses both indoors and outside they also believe he may seek shelter in communities with Egyptian ties he frequents Denny's and IHOP restaurant smokes Marlboro cigarettes and is a dog lover Saeed is known to have ties to New York Texas Virginia Canada and Egypt if you have any information on where he can be found you can call 1-800 call FBI

Channel: True Crime Daily

Views: 8,300,491

Rating: 4.8218193 out of 5

Keywords: Yaser Said, Amina Said, Sarah Said, Crime Watch Daily, True Crime Daily

Id: MsPb5fWY_Q4

Length: 34min 15sec (2055 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 12 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/Tiny_Pay]

Nobody’s gonna talk about how the brother got treated better than the sisters and bragged on clip how the Dad “liked him”

[u/Massive-Gas]

The girls were born in America but that father didn't want them to live like American. You cannot force ur kids how to live even though u're their parents.