DALLAS: A Pakistani-born mother told an emergency telephone operator she killed her two young children because they were autistic and she wanted “normal kids”.
Police released a recording of the call after Saiqa Akhter was charged with the murder of her five-year-old son, Zain, who died at the family’s apartment on Monday night, local time. Another murder charge is pending for the death of her two-year-old daughter, Faryaal, on Tuesday night.
“I killed them. I killed both of them,” she tells the operator in the recording. “They are not doing anything. They are just blue and they are not taking any breaths and . . . their heart is not beating.”
She says she tried to poison the children with bathroom cleaner, but they refused to drink it. When that didn’t work, “I used a wire on their necks”.
Asked why, she says: “They’re both not normal, not normal. They’re autistic. Both are autistic . . . I don’t want my children to be like that . . . I want normal kids.”
The dispatcher asks the woman what she is feeling. “Nothing,” she responds.
If convicted of capital murder, Ms Akhter could face the death penalty, although prosecutors have not said they will seek that punishment. Otherwise, she could face life in prison without parole.
Ms Akhter’s uncle, Wasimul Haque, told The Dallas Morning News his niece had been depressed since moving into a new apartment in the city of Irving. He said Zain had autism and a severe speech impediment, but had been improving.
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