By Larbi Arbaoui
Morocco World News
Tinejdad, July 20, 2013
According to Sun-sentinel.com, a Moroccan woman told Palm Beach County deputies that her husband kept her locked inside home in Wellington for three years, threatening to kill her if she ever goes outside.
The woman, whose family lives in Morocco, told the deputies on Wednesday that she was subject of mal-treatment since she first came to the country three years ago by her husband Qasem Alabed, 42, from Pakistan, who is now behind bars facing a slew of charges, including aggravated battery on a pregnant woman.
According to the same source, the victim told deputies "that she has not been let out of the house in the past three years that she has been here in the USA."
The Pakistani husband was beating his wife with a television remote control and swatting her with a cable whenever she runs for safety.
The beating continued even after she became pregnant, she told deputies.
"Be brave and leave and find the police," a family friend told her, according to the report.
The Moroccan mother managed to escape with her three year old son and found her way to the Wellington City Hall, only few blocks where her husband locked her, and the deputy recorded her statement and took pictures of the welts on her body.
"We do see cases where someone may be held for a couple of days, especially if they have been battered," said Alexcia Cox, an assistant state attorney in Palm Beach County who heads the office's domestic violence unit, according to the same source.
"I've never seen as much as three years, but several days to a week," she said.
As for the tactics that the alleged abuser used to keep his wife indoors, Jennifer Rey, at Aid to Victims of Domestic Violence in Delray Beach, said “abusers employ any method to maintain control that they believe will work, often couching their behavior in logical explanations", “Their goal is power and control," she said, as quoted by the sun-sentinel.com.
The Moroccan mother and her little son were moved to a safe location.