Enam Hmeed: Mum allegedly beat daughter for not marrying cousin

WARNING: Disturbing details

A woman allegedly beaten against a concrete wall by her mother for not marrying her first cousin will never set foot in the family home again, a court has been told.

Enam Hmeed, 45, and her husband Mohamed Al-Fadhli were arrested in April after police allegedly discovered their daughter Rhonda in their convenience store in western NSW with a metal chain padlocked around her neck.

Police allege Hmeed and Al-Fadhli assaulted their 21-year-old daughter on separate occasions after finding out she was still in contact with her boyfriend, who had asked the parents for permission to marry her.

The marriage proposal had been refused because the father wanted his eldest daughter to marry his brother’s son — the woman’s first cousin — in an arranged marriage, police say.

After discovering Rhonda on the phone with her boyfriend, Hmeed allegedly grabbed her daughter by the hair and hit her head against a concrete wall multiple times.

The mother is also accused of biting her daughter and attacking her with a garden hose.

Al-Fadhli allegedly travelled nearly 400km back to the family’s shop in Dubbo from Sydney Airport after hearing from his wife about the secret phone call.

The father is accused of locking a silver chain around his daughter before repeatedly attacking her with the hose.

Rhonda was able to contact both police and her boyfriend with a hidden phone and alert them to her condition on two separate occasions on April 20.

The parents denied there were any problems initially before police, called a second time, found Rhonda with a locked chain around her neck, Supreme Court Justice Robertson Wright said.

The judge made the comments as he agreed to vary Hmeed’s bail conditions on Tuesday.

The change allows the mother to return to her family home in the Sydney suburb of Yagoona after Rhonda said she would never visit the house.

Hmeed had been living with a friend since being bailed in June.

The case will return to Dubbo Local Court on October 23.

Hmeed is facing one charge of detaining in company and a charge of domestic violence assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

No pleas have been entered by the parents but lawyers on Tuesday suggested a contested hearing was on the cards.

Australian law bans marriage between siblings or to a descendent, such as a grandchild, but cousins are permitted to marry if both parties are freely entering the wedlock.

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