Ariz. Honor Killing: Police Worried Family Members Might Have Tried to Attack Daughter Again

In 2009, 20-year-old Noor Al-Maleki was killed after her father, Faleh Al-Maleki, ran her over with his car in Peoria, Ariz. She suffered multiple injuries and went into a coma. She was taken off life support and died less than two weeks later.

Prosecutors said it was an honor killing, because the Iraqi-born young woman who immigrated to the United States had become "too Westernized" and brought shame to the family for eschewing traditional Iraqi values -- shunning an arranged marriage and instead living with a boyfriend and his parents.

In February, Faleh was found not guilty of murder in the first degree, but was convicted of murder in the second degree. He is currently serving a 34 1/2 year sentence.

Now, audio records obtained by Fox News show that police believed Noor would be attacked again by family members, even as she lay unconscious in a hospital bed.

In one tape, Peoria police detective Bill Laing refuses to tell Noor's mother, Seham Al-Maleki, where her daughter was until her father -- who at first fled to the United Kingdom before being extradited back -- was found. Laing tells Seham that her husband ran over Noor and her friend Amal Khalaf:

“I want to see my daughter!” Seham Al-Maleki screams on the tape.

“Until he [Noor’s father] is located, we are not mentioning where she is at,” responds Laing, who told the mother that witnesses in the parking lot identified her husband as the driver.

“This woman, she is lying, because she is dirty,” Seham says, referring to Noor’s friend Khalaf, who survived being hit by Al-Maleki’s jeep.

“You are a sick person,” Laing snaps.

Mohamed El-Sharkawy of the Arizona Muslim Police Advisory Board told Fox News that authorities worried another family member might try to attack Noor again to be sure she was dead.

"They were afraid that, because he did not succeed, that somebody else, his son or a relative, will go and finish her off," El-Sharkawy said.

Although Faleh was convicted of second-degree murder, because he was acquitted of first-degree murder, prosecutor Laura Reckart told Fox in an interview that she felt she had ultimately "failed" Noor.

"I'm not going to say I respect their verdict," Reckart said.

During the trial, she played recorded prison phone calls of Faleh talking with his wife, discussing how "an Iraqi without honor is nothing" and even though he was in jail, Noor "is comfortable now" in her grave.

Still, Judge Roland Steinle told Fox he believed it was wrong to classify Noor's murder as an honor killing:

"I think it sensationalizes what is nothing more than a parent killing a child," he said.