Sara Sharif had more than 70 recent injuries after her death, court told

Sara Sharif had suffered more than 70 injuries shortly before she was found dead in her home, a court has heard.

A pathologist also gave the girl’s cause of death as “complications arising from multiple injuries and neglect”.

Taxi driver Urfan Sharif, 42, is on trial at the Old Bailey accused of his 10-year-old daughter’s murder alongside Sara’s stepmother Beinash Batool, 30, and uncle, Faisal Malik, 29.

Police found Sara’s body in a bunk bed in her home in Woking, Surrey, on August 10 last year following a call from Sharif in Pakistan saying he “beat her up too much” for being “naughty”, the court has heard.

It is alleged Sara had died two days before and within hours the defendants had booked a flight out of the country.

Giving evidence on Wednesday, forensic pathologist Dr Nathaniel Cary said some of Sara’s external injuries, which included dozens of bruises, grazes and burns, were the result of “repetitive blunt trauma” and “blunt impact or solid pressure, or both.”

He told the court there were more than 71 injuries to the little girl’s body.

They included significant damage internally, including bleeding on her brain, multiple bruises on her lungs and multiple skeletal injuries, jurors heard.

Dr Cary presented his findings from a post-mortem examination of Sara’s body he carried out on August 15 2023 which took around three hours.

Sara had a height of 1.37 metres and a weight of 27 kilograms, with both measurements within the average bracket for a child her age but towards the lower end, the court heard.

The court heard no natural diseases or drugs had contributed to Sara’s death.

Among the older injuries were “blotchy scarring” on the left jawline, multiple purple scars around the pelvis, marks from the lower left leg to the top of the foot and fine scars and blotchy brown discolouration on the left forearm.

Recent injuries were identified across all parts of Sara’s body, including on her face, fingers, ankles and back.

She suffered a puncture wound on her forehead which Dr Cary told jurors was “sharp or semi-sharp” and had been left “gaping”.

There were bruises and grazes all over her head and face, including bruising on her right cheek and ear and a “healing, deep graze” on her nose.

A collar of purple-red bruising described by Dr Cary as “intense” was identified around the neck, top of the chest and shoulders which was from “blunt impact or solid pressure, or both”.

Further green and blue bruising was identified in the upper abdomen and around the belly button.

There was a large area of ulceration on Sara’s buttock, which Dr Cary told jurors he believed resulted from burns, while there two ulcerated areas over her ankle bones.

On Sara’s legs there were more bruises, grazes and multiple linear red marks, which the pathologist said could have come from “repetitive blunt trauma”.

Dr Cary said purple-red bruising on Sara’s right thigh was likely caused by “multiple impacts with a linear object”.

Asked about two linear grazes on the girl’s arm, he told jurors the injury could have been caused by a semi-sharp object “scraping” and potentially “an object used as a weapon”.

A deep area of skin was also missing on Sara’s ring finger on her left hand.

Sara’s brain suffered bleeding on its surface and sustained bruising, but showed no evidence of internal bleeding.

An examination of her brain found “features of traumatic injury of a few days duration” before her death, the court heard.

Reading his conclusions, Dr Cary gave Sara’s cause of death as “complications arising from multiple injuries and neglect” and described it as “unnatural”.

He said the findings were in keeping with “significant and repetitive blunt force trauma” and did not exclude the possibility of Sara’s burns contributing to her death through sepsis.

Previously, jurors have heard Sara had suffered “probable human bite marks”, an iron burn and scalding from hot water.

Traces of the 10-year-old’s blood were discovered on the kitchen floor, a vacuum cleaner and a cricket bat following a police search of the family home, the prosecution said.

The defendants, of Hammond Road in Woking, have denied murder and causing or allowing the death of a child between December 16 2022 and August 9 2023.

The trial continues.