Bouchra Marbouhi says she last saw her daughter on the morning of Friday, September 26, when she was getting her ready for school. He told the girl that her father would pick her up to spend the night at home.
“My birthday was the 29th. Then she said, ‘Mommy, I made you a card for your birthday,'” Marbouchi, 31, said in a recent interview.
“I kissed her and said, ‘Thank you. Where is she?’ She said, ‘It’s in my bag.’ When I come back tomorrow I’ll show you.”
But Marbouhi never received the card.
Marbouhi said she has not seen her five-year-old daughter in more than a month, after her father, Ahmed ElGammal, took her out of the country, despite a court order aimed at stopping him.
CBC News is not revealing the girl’s name to protect her privacy.
“I miss her smell. I miss her voice. I miss her when she was stubborn and stupid,” Marbouhi said, clutching her daughter’s stuffed toy.
“I miss him calling me mommy. I miss everything. When that happened, I feel like my life stopped.”
Newfoundland and Labrador police on Wednesday issued an arrest warrant for ElGammal, 36, on charges of parental abduction in violation of a custody or paternity order.
However, Marbouhi is eager to confirm her daughter’s safety and bring her home.
Taken by plane
According to text messages provided to CBC News and translated from Arabic, Marbouhi wrote to her ex-husband the morning after the sleepover asking them to drop off their daughter early. ElGammal responded that he wanted more time with her.
Then, at 5:46 p.m., ElGammal wrote: “[Our daughter] and I returned to our country.”
And he added: “Do you want [raise] her about our religion and ethics, you know where to find us.”
At first he thought it was an empty threat, but Marbouhi said he immediately drove to St. John’s International Airport and called police while he was on the road.
The Royal Newfoundland Constabulary confirmed to CBC News that they received a report of a child who had been kidnapped by a person they knew, on the night of September 27.
“This is an active and ongoing investigation and the RNC is using all available resources to locate and confirm the safety of the child,” police said in a statement.
“We can confirm that this case did not meet the criteria to issue an Amber Alert.”
Marbouhi said police told him ElGammal flew from St. John’s to Montreal and then left the country.
The non-deportation order gave a ‘false sense of security’
Marbouhi said she suspected her ex-husband would try to take their daughter to their home country of Egypt, so she requested (and received) an emergency interim court order to prevent the girl’s expulsion from the province.
“I am very afraid that my husband will take away my care of my four-year-old daughter or remove her from the jurisdiction,” she wrote in an emergency provisional application filed on May 16.
“I fear that because of his loss of control over me, he will retain or move in with my daughter. He knows I would return to him if I had my daughter.”
In late May, the family division of the Supreme Court of Newfoundland and Labrador ordered that the girl reside primarily with her mother, at Iris Kirby House. They had been living at the women’s shelter since Marbouhi fled the family home in March.
In court documents, ElGammal disagreed and said the family home was “adequate.”
“Child protection did not indicate any concerns regarding me, the father, and I was seeing my daughter normally until she falsely claimed that she would take my daughter back to Egypt.” ElGammal wrote in a family court filing dated June 6.
ElGammal wrote that he could not leave with her, since the girl’s Egyptian and Moroccan passports were with her mother.
Marbouhi believes ElGammal got his daughter a new passport during a recent trip to Egypt, allowing him to leave the country with her. However, he has not received any confirmation in this regard.
In court documents, ElGammal asked the court for a non-deportation order and the surrender of the passports.
The non-removal order states that neither party may remove the child from the greater St. John’s area without the written approval of the other parent.
ElGammaI have not yet responded to questions emailed by CBC News on Wednesday.
Marbouhi said she did what she thought was right to protect her daughter. Now he questions the obvious gaps he sees in the system.
“That non-deportation order gave me a false sense of security. That’s why I feel so angry. Nobody tells me it’s nothing, it’s just a piece of paper,” she said.
“Then why give such an order and there is no mechanism to enforce it?”
The Canada Border Services Agency had not responded to questions from CBC News as of Wednesday afternoon.
Marbouhi said her ex-husband’s family tried to convince him to let her talk to their daughter, but that didn’t happen. His requests to see recent photos of the girl were also denied. Marbouhi said ElGammal stopped communicating with her after her landlord in St. John’s inadvertently tipped her off that police were involved.
Marbouhi said ElGammal’s family has told her that their daughter does not want to talk to her.
“I’m worried that she’ll think I don’t love her,” he said.
“I don’t know if he really said he doesn’t want to talk to me, that’s not normal for me. [My daughter] He was very, very attached to me. She is not emotionally safe. I know that.”
Marbouhi said taking his daughter was ElGammal’s way of punishing Marbouhi for abandoning him.
ElGammal wrote in a text message that he would allow Marbouhi to raise her daughter, but only in Egypt and “on my terms.”
“If you like [raise] he [daughter]“It will be on my terms,” he said.
Temporary residence permit denied
Complicating matters is Marbouhi’s immigration status in Canada.
Marbouhi is a Moroccan citizen. He arrived in St. John’s in May 2024 on a closed work visa.
She applied for a temporary residence permit for victims of family violence, but was denied the day before her daughter was taken away.
Charlotte Sullivan, one of the lawyers who assisted in Marbouhi’s immigration case, said the matter is now under judicial review and they have raised the matter with Marbouhi’s deputy’s office to expedite it.
“I can’t wait that long,” Marbouhi said. “I need to go back there and get my son back.”
Sullivan said Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada did not provide a reason for rejecting Marbouhi’s application.
Meanwhile, Marbouhi has been asking for a welfare check on her daughter, and has even provided police with an address where she believes ElGammal is staying. But to date he has received no guarantees that the girl is safe.
Canada does not have an extradition treaty with Egypt.
Marbouhi said the RNC told him they had submitted a request to both Interpol and the RCMP to arrange a welfare check.
Interpol told CBC News it does not discuss specific cases without approval from the country in question.
The RCMP has not yet responded to CBC’s request for comment.
Back at Iris Kirby House, the playground is now covered in orange and yellow leaves. A message written in chalk wishing a happy birthday to the kindergartner is fading. A sign of the progress of the season.
Marbouhi said her daughter, whose closet is a sea of pink and sparkles, was excited to dress up as a princess this year for Halloween.
Halloween events at the shelter this year are cancelled. They are not going to move forward without her.
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