Shymkent Court Sentences Husband to 1.5 Years After Wife's Death

A Shymkent court has issued a verdict in the case of 42-year-old Sholpan Akmyrza, a mother of seven who died after falling from the window of a third-floor apartment on February 5. While the official cause of death was ruled a suicide, her family believes she was thrown by her husband following years of domestic abuse, Orda.kz reports.

The incident was witnessed by the couple’s two youngest children, ages two and four. According to the family, the children said their mother had been thrown from the window by their father.

However, due to their age, their statements were not admitted as testimony during the trial.

The investigation ultimately classified the case as incitement to suicide. The husband admitted to beating his wife during an argument over a loan she allegedly took out without his knowledge. He claimed he was in another room when she fell.

The court sentenced him to one and a half years in a minimum-security facility:

The conflict was over a loan. The man found out about it from his wife’s phone and started an argument. He admitted to insulting and physically assaulting her, but claimed to be in another room at the moment she fell. There’s no direct evidence he pushed her. The case was classified as incitement to suicide,
 the judge explained.

Sholpan’s daughters strongly disagreed with the court’s decision, stating their mother endured 20 years of abuse. They said the youngest children had seen their father hit her with a dumbbell before throwing her from the window.

They also questioned why the children's accounts were disregarded.

It’s painful to know the man who caused our mother’s death received such a mild sentence. He asked us for forgiveness in his final statement — but we will never forgive him. She suffered her whole life to take care of us. If she really intended to end her life, she wouldn’t have taken out a loan just three days earlier. Now we’re left to pay the loan, and the land she bought is in his name,
said the daughters.

Sholpan Akmyrza left behind seven children, the youngest just two years old. Though she and her husband officially divorced in 2020, they later resumed living together without remarrying.

Two more children were born during that time.

Original Author: Nazerke Erkinbekkyzy