The Farmington Hills mosque whose members have been charged in a female genital mutilation scandal denied allegations Wednesday that it paid to have the procedure performed on girls.
In a letter, the Anjuman-e-Najmi mosque called the accusation, made during a custody hearing Tuesday by attorney Cynthia Nunez, false.
“At no time has the Anjuman-e-Najmim, Detroit mosque paid for any religious medical procedure whatsoever,” the mosque said in a statement. “These comments are made without factual evidence to back it up and are intended to intently misstate, overstate and inflame an already difficult situation.”
Nunez represents two children of Dr. Jumana Nagarwala, who’s one of four people charged with performing the outlawed medical procedure. State welfare officials are seeking to terminate the parental rights of Nagarwala and her husband, who has not been charged.
During a hearing in Wayne County Juvenile Court, Nunez, said the physician was paid to cut girls as part of a procedure practiced by some members of their religious and cultural community, the Dawoodi Bohra.
The comments were made at a hearing for Nagarwala and her husband on a petition by the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services to terminate the couple’s parental custody and remove the children from their home.
Nagarwala, 44, has been charged in federal court with mutilating the genitals of two 7-year-old Minnesota girls at a Livonia clinic Feb. 3.
Mosque officials also sent a letter to Nunez on Wednesday.
“As a lawyer, you have a special responsibility for the quality of justice, and a duty of candor toward the court,” reads the letter from attorney Ashish S. Joshi. “Given your duties as a lawyer, you must correct your false statement, and immediately inform the court that Anjuman-e-Najmi, Detroit has never paid for any physician services.”
The religious group says it is a nonprofit organization that has been in the United States since the 1950s and has 12,000 members.
“We take our religion seriously but our culture is modern and forward-looking,” according to the statement the mosque released. “We are proud that women from our community have high levels of educational attainment and enjoy successful, professional careers.”
The statements do not mention the terms “female genital mutilation.” In the letter to Nunez, the term is quoted from a newspaper headline.
Nunez, an attorney for the Michigan Children’s Law Center, could not immediately be reached for comment Wednesday.
The Nagarwalas’ attorney disputed Nunez’s claims Tuesday.
“That’s absolutely not true,” Shannon Smith said after the hearing before Judge Frank Szymanski.
Smith added, “the government has grossly misstated and overstated things, so many facts in this case, and that’s one.” Nagarawala was not paid to perform mutilation, said Smith. The attorney said the physician was paid for items she bought for the mosque’s food bank.
“We have all of the proof of it being for bread, for pizza ... for two-liter pop. Stuff like that,” Smith said after the hearing Tuesday. “It’s so insane to me that they keep saying this. It’s not true.”
Last week, a federal prosecutor testified that as many as 100 girls may have had their genitalia mutilated during a 12-year conspiracy involving three Metro Detroit doctors.
The child custody hearing for the Nagarwalas continues at 11 a.m. June 20.
On Tuesday, three children were scheduled to be removed from another home as part of a state investigation into whether one of the children was the victim of female genital mutilation.
The attorney for the children, said she could not give details on the case but said there were no connection between her case and the charges against Nagarwala.
An attorney for three other Wayne County children, who remain with their parents, asked for a preliminary examination in Wayne County Juvenile Court as part of an investigation into whether their parents are linked to the female genital mutilation conspiracy.
Last month, an Oakland County Juvenile Court referee approved a petition that could terminate the parental rights of a Farmington Hills couple, Dr. Fakhruddin Attar, 52, and his 50-year-old wife, Farida. The couple are co-defendants in the case against Nagarwala and are jailed while awaiting further proceedings.
Two other couples, who have not been charged in the case, are at the center of a complaint by Michigan child welfare officials that seeks to end their parental rights. In a hearing May 9, an Oakland County Juvenile Court referee allowed the couples of both children to remain with them while the mutilation investigation continues.