Footage showing the moment police boarded a plane and detained Sara Sharif’s alleged killers as they arrived back in the UK has been shown to jurors.
The three relatives of Sara had travelled to Pakistan on 9 August 2023, the day after she died at the family home in Woking, Surrey.
As police approached their seats on board an Emirates flight when they returned on 13 September, Sara’s stepmother Beinash Batool can be seen raising her hand, saying: “I think you’re looking for us.”
Ms Batool, 30, Sara’s father, Urfan Sharif, 42, and her uncle, Faisal Malik, 29, deny murder and causing or allowing the death of a child at their trial at the Old Bailey.
Sara’s body was discovered in a bunkbed at her home on 10 August 2023.
Jurors previously heard she had been hooded, burned, bitten and beaten during more than two years of abuse.
The video shows a number of officers with police identification on their backs boarding the plane from Dubai seven minutes after it had landed at Gatwick Airport.
When officers approached Mr Sharif they asked him if he had a bag with him. He said he didn’t.
He was then handcuffed on the plane.
The footage then shows Mr Sharif standing by a police van, where he was arrested on suspicion of the murder of his daughter.
The video also shows Mr Malik and Ms Batool being arrested off the plane on suspicion of the murder.
All three accused were interviewed separately by police the day after they were held. They all made no comment to questions asked by officers.
The jury also heard on Friday how social services decided not to take any further action despite a referral from Sara’s school after bruises were spotted on the girl months before she died.
In March 2023, five months before Sara’s body was discovered at the family home in Woking, Surrey, Sara’s teacher noticed a bruise on her chin along with a “dark bruise like mark on her right eye”.
Sara said that her eye was just very itchy and the mark on her chin was from falling on her rollerskates.
The 10-year-old was later spoken to by the headteacher and asked if she was ok.
The court heard that Sara buried her face and gave a different account to the one she had previously told her teacher.
The school contacted Children’s Single Point of Access for advice who agreed that a referral to social services was needed.
On 16 March, six days after the bruises were noticed, social services decided to take no further action on the referral.
The following month Sara’s father informed the school that Sara was to be withdrawn to be home schooled.
The trial at the Old Bailey continues.
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