'We had no spare keys'
KLANG: AS housewife Alha Kusain came to terms with her daughter's murder, she could not help but wonder if things would have panned out differently if she had kept a duplicate set of house keys.
The body of Nur Amyliana Shuhada Mohd Noor was found at an open air car park in Bukit Tinggi, here on Wednesday night. Asphyxiation was the cause of death, and there were signs that she was sexually assaulted. She would have turned 12 on Sept 1.
But Alha said yesterday that it could all have turned out differently if only she had an extra set of house keys and let Nur Amyliana in instead of asking her to wait for her elder sister, Nur Hidayah, to come home.
"My daughter had gone out to play and came home about 4pm. She asked me to open the grille door to let her in but I could not, as Nur Hidayah had taken the keys with her when she went grocery shopping," said Alha in tears.
"I asked Nur Amyliana to wait on the staircase for her sister to return. After a while, I heard her talking to two men," she said when met at her home in Bukit Tinggi yesterday.
Sensing something amiss, Alha called out to Nur Amyliana, asking her who she was talking to. Nur Amyliana said she was talking to an "uncle" but did not say who it was.
Alha felt anxious and began looking for tools to break the padlock to let Nur Amyliana into the house, before realising that Nur Amyliana was no longer there.
When Nur Hidayah returned from the supermarket, her mother told what had happened and they went out to look for Nur Amyliana.
About 10pm, Nur Hidayah received a call from a cousin who lives in the same neighbourhood, informing her that Nur Amyliana had been found nearby.
"My mother felt a sense of dread when I told her, and went running out of the house. She screamed when she saw the body lying on the ground and rushed to her," Nur Hidayah said. Nur Amyliana was the third of seven children, aged between three and 20.
The family had just moved here about two months ago from Kuantan. Alha's husband, Pelayon Dandris, 40, works as an operator in a nearby factory.
Following the incident, two men, aged 29 and 24, were arrested in the vicinity, as witnesses claimed that they were last seen at the scene prior to the discovery of Nur Amyliana's body.
Klang South police chief Assistant Commissioner Muhammad Mat Yusop said the two men, both factory workers, have been remanded for a week in order to facilitate investigations.
The car park is very dark at night, especially with factory buses parked there. Blocks of shophouses surround all four sides of an adjacent field.
R.C. Kalaivanjini, 19, was walking with her friend to a nearby shophouse to buy supper when they spotted Nur Amyliana's body at 10pm. The two girls called out to Nur Amyliana but there was no reply.
"An uncle passing by asked us why we were shouting and we pointed the body out to him. He then called the police," Kalaivanjini said.
"Police arrived 10 minutes later and began cordoning off the area. It was then that we realised something was terribly wrong, and our suspicions were confirmed when the girl's family arrived shortly afterwards."
Police have been urged to step up their patrols as well as work closely with the residents in order to ensure security in the area.
The call came from Barisan Nasional Wanita chief Datuk Seri Shahrizat Jalil, who visited Nur Amyliana's family yesterday.
"The victim's mother wants police to arrest the culprits as soon as possible, as there is a possibility that they will attack other children and women if still on the loose.
"She wants justice for her daughter," said Shahrizat, who is also chairman of the National Welfare Foundation.
Shahrizat said although the area was dark, it was not an excuse for such a crime to happen.
"The victim is only 11 years old. I don't know how the perpetrator could have committed such a heinous crime," she said.
Barisan Nasional Wanita chief Datuk Seri Shahrizat Jalil visiting the victim’s mother, Alha Kusain, 42, in Bandar Bukit Tinggi, Klang.
She has called for more police patrols in the area.
Pic by Asyraf Hamzah
