Two parents in Lacey, Washington, were arrested for allegedly attempting to kill their 17-year-old daughter after she refused to marry an older man in an arranged match, police said.
According to police, Ihsan Ali and his wife, Zahraa Ali, were charged with attempted murder for the attack, which took place outside Timberline High School, where the daughter, who was not identified, is enrolled.
In charging documents obtained by the New York Post, the daughter said that "her father had recently been threatening her with honor killing for refusing an arranged marriage with an older man in another county."
She ran away and went to school staff for help on Oct. 18 before her parents showed up and attacked her outside the building.
According to court documents, the girl's father choked her "to the point where she had lost consciousness" as other students, including her boyfriend, tried to pull her away.
"It's not right … you are not supposed to do this," the girl's father told her before she blacked out, the girl told police.
Video obtained by Fox 13 Seattle shows Ihsan shoving his daughter's face in the dirt while a group of students yells at him to stop. Police said the father also punched the daughter's boyfriend in the face during the attack.
The charging documents state that the girl's mother, Zahraa, also grabbed hold of her daughter and tried to choke her.
Josh Wagner, who witnessed the incident, told KOMO he had been driving by with his family before he stopped to break up what he initially thought was a bus stop fight between kids.
"It was pretty angering," Wagner said. "All the kids were screaming, yelling."
Wagner, who saw the father holding his daughter in a headlock, was reportedly able to pull him off of her and keep him pinned until the police arrived.
The girl then ran to the school's main office with her boyfriend screaming, "My dad was trying to kill me," which triggered a campus lockdown as staff prevented the parents from accessing the building.
Victor Barnes, the boyfriend's father, told KOMO that an alleged physical confrontation led the family to seek a temporary protection order against the Ali family.
According to Britannica, an honor killing is a practice where family members justify killing someone they are related to by claiming the victim has brought shame and dishonor to the family. As many as 5,000 women are killed in honor killings each year, according to estimates from the United Nations Population Fund.
The Post reported that the girl's school found her a safe place to stay, as authorities continue to investigate the incident.
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