Iraqi mother ‘beaten to death’ in the US

Added by Annika L. Krugel on March 27, 2012

An Iraqi woman that brutally beaten in her southern California home in an apparently racially-motivated attack reportedly has died in hospital.

Shaima Alawadi, 32 and a mother of five, died after she was taken off life support Saturday at a hospital in San Diego County.

Ms Alawadi had been on life support since Wednesday when her teenage daughter found her unconscious in the living room of their home.

“During the initial stages of this investigation, a threatening note was discovered very close to where the victim was found,” said police Lieutenant Mark Coit.

Ms Alawadi’s daughter said the note told the family to go back to Iraq and called them “terrorists,” according a source close to the matter.

“A week ago they left a letter saying, ‘This is our country, not yours, you terrorists,'” said the daughter, Fatima Al Himidi.

“So my mom ignored that, thinking (it was) kids playing around, pranking.

“And so the day they hurt her, they left it again and it said the same thing.”

The family reportedly came to the United States from Iraq in the mid-1990s.