But defense lawyers said the police investigation was botched from the start. Officers zeroed in on Said after the girls’ boyfriends accused him of the killings and never investigated other people, defense attorney Joseph Patton said.
Patton said the boyfriends kick-started a narrative that Said killed his daughters because he didn’t want them to have American boyfriends. Said was born in Egypt and has dual citizenship.
The boys talked to police, Patton said, but officers did not test them for gunshot residue. Police also did not compare their fingerprints or DNA to the crime scene, Patton said. Dozens of law enforcement officials are expected to testify in the coming days, Patton said.
“Rather than investigating the murders, they were investigating Yaser,” he said. “Evidence cannot and will not support a conviction for capital murder.”
‘He will … kill us’
About two weeks before they fled, Amina, Sarah, Ruiz and Sarah’s boyfriend, Erik Panameno, hatched a plan, the men testified. Panameno said he was willing to drop out of school to support the girls’ dreams of becoming doctors.
Amina originally planned to escape by herself, Ruiz said. But Ruiz suggested she take Sarah to protect her. Ruiz said she should also take her mom in case their romance ended. Her mom could protect her, Ruiz said.
Amina emailed Lewisville High School history teacher Renee Hopkins on Dec. 21, 2007, the teacher testified. She told Hopkins of her plan to leave and begged her for secrecy until she resettled. Amina feared her dad finding out.
“He will, without any drama or doubt, kill us,” Amina wrote in the email Hopkins shared with school administrators.
The educator’s face grew red and she blinked back tears as a prosecutor read the email aloud.
Amina’s friend, Caitlin Rogers, testified she received an email from Amina on Christmas Day 2007. Amina seemed positive and hopeful, Rogers said.
The girls, their mother and boyfriends settled in Tulsa after a brief stint in Kansas, where Owens had family.
On Dec. 26, 2007, Said reported his wife and daughters missing to Lewisville police. On Dec. 27, Lewisville police Sgt. Michael Wragg testified he received a call from Owens. She said she was “alive and well” but feared her husband and asked how to enroll her daughters in a new school without him knowing, Wragg said. The call filled with static before it dropped, he said.
Ruiz left Tulsa to return to Lewisville for a family New Year’s Eve party. On Dec. 30, Amina texted him saying they decided to go back because her mom needed to run errands.
“It wasn’t a group decision,” Panameno said. “I think Sarah wanted to fix things and Patricia kind of convinced us all it was going to be safe.”
But Amina was dubious. She stayed with Ruiz at his parents’ house while her mother and Sarah returned to Said.
Aunt told them to flee
On Jan. 1, 2008, Amina called her aunt, Connie Moggio. Moggio testified that her niece sounded “frantic” and said Owens went back to her dad.
Moggio said she told Amina to go to the Lewisville Police Department, file a restraining order against her father and “go as far as” she could.
Owens showed up at the doorstep of Ruiz’s parents’ house about 5 or 6 p.m. and demanded Amina go home. Owens grabbed her daughter by the hand and forced her out the house, Ruiz said.
Amina told Ruiz he had failed her.
Ruiz and his father later spotted the girls and Said in a taxi that evening. The pair pulled alongside the taxi, and Ruiz said he saw Amina in the front passenger seat looking at Said, who was driving. Sarah was in the rear passenger seat. Amina seemed uncomfortable and fearful, Ruiz recalled.
About 7:30 p.m. that night, Sarah called 911 and said her dad shot her and she was dying.
A man called authorities about an hour later after discovering their bodies in the taxi outside the Omni Mandalay Hotel in Las Colinas, part of Irving. Prosecutors said the girls had been shot multiple times.
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