Doctors Are Charged Over Genital Mutilation Of Girls Claim It Is An Islamic Practice

Two doctors and a woman have been indicted by a grand jury over the alleged brutal genital mutilation of two seven-year-old girls from Minnesota.

Detroit-based doctors Jumana Nagarwala and Fakhruddin Attar, as well as Attar's wife Farida, have been charged with female genital mutilation and conspiracy. The two doctors are also charged with making false statements to investigators.

Dr Nagarwala, 44, is accused of performing genital mutilation on the two young girls at a private Livonia clinic in Michigan after hours in February. The Burhani Medical Clinic is owned by Dr Attar.

Dr Nagarwala, who is an emergency room doctor at Henry Ford Health System, denied the allegations last week and claimed she was performing a religious practice for families in a Muslim sect that did not involve cutting.

Through her lawyer, Dr Nagarwala claims she scraped membrane from the girls' genitalia as part of the religious custom.

But doctors reports obtained by the Detroit Free Press indicate the children suffered more severe injuries including scarring, a small tear, lacerations and what appeared to be the surgical removal of a portion of genitalia.

Dr Attar's attorney says her client may have let Dr Nagarwala use his clinic but claims he had no knowledge of what procedures she was performing.

Dr Nagarwala was arrested on April 12 while attempting to board a flight to Kenya to visit her daughter.

Her arrest came just days after the two alleged victims identified her as the person who performed medical procedures on them. The girls had been brought into the clinic by their mothers but the parents have not been charged.

Authorities say Dr Nagarwala was never employed at the clinic where the alleged mutilation took place and that she was able to perform the procedures after hours.

Dr Attar and his wife, who works at the clinic as an office manager, were arrested on Friday morning. They allegedly arranged and assisted in the genital mutilation procedures by Dr Nagarwala, police claim.
All three are accused of trying to keep the practice secret within their Indian-Muslim community, according to the indictment. 

Authorities claim the trio have been part of a female genital mutilation scheme since 2005 and there could be a number of other young victims. The trio have denied any wrongdoing.

They are all part of the Dawoodi Bohra community, which is a Gujarati-speaking Muslim sect concentrated mostly in India. The group has a mosque in suburban Detroit.