Custodial dad murders 3 children (Taif, Saudi Arabia)

UNNAMED DAD had custody of the children, as is the legal custom in Saudi Arabia. His wife had left him and returned to her father's home. She had wanted, somehow, to get the children back. But that won't happen now that Dad has stabbed two of the children to death, and beheaded the third.

http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1&section=0&article=124700&d=20&m=7&y=2009&pix=kingdom.jpg&category=Kingdom

Monday 20 July 2009 (27 Rajab 1430)

Soaked in blood, killer dad called cops
Arab News

TAIF: More details have come out in the cold-blooded murder of three children by their father in Al-Qumriyah district of this highland city in the Western Region. According to Sunday’s edition of the local daily Shams, the father is a former military police officer in his 50s who was crippled last year in a car accident that ended his career. His wife left him some time after the accident and went back to live with her family.

After murdering his three children, the man — whose name is not being made public — called police to inform them of his crime and waited at his home, drenched in blood, for the authorities to arrive and arrest him.

Shams described the crime in detail, presumably citing official reports. After his brothers left the house, the man began with his six-year-old daughter, Siham, stabbing her more than 10 times in the chest and abdomen. Five-year-old Raid came next; the father beheaded him. Then the man went after seven-month-old Lamis, stabbing the baby girl to death.

Some neighbors say the father committed the crime after receiving a telephone call from his wife who threatened that she would take the three children from him.