All language subtitles for TikTok Murder Gone Viral S01 E02_track3_[eng]

DISTANT SCREAMS

WOMAN: No! No! No! No!

WOMAN: Unlocked. Please!

PANICKED VOICES
Here!

He tries once to kill himself
and then take her with him...

Here.

..and he fails.

RAHEEL:

Raheel attempted to commit suicide

and take her out the window
with him.

RAHEEL:

So the next time,
he makes sure there's no mistake.

He had one intention in mind
and that was to kill Sania.

It kind of felt unbelievable
that someone so positive

and liquid sunshine
can be just snuffed out.

In South Asian households,

even if there's oppressiveness
or abuse,

women are told,
"Tough it out and stick with it."

Well, Sania Khan's story
is known around the world.

She was an avid photographer
and had gone viral on TikTok

documenting her journey
getting out of an abusive marriage.

She was absolutely
considering divorce at that point.

Sania's messaging about her decision
to leave her abusive relationship

was getting to about
a million people.

It's naive to think that
he would not see those.

They're a direct
and public humiliation of him.

He's shown that he is capable
of being an extremely dangerous man.

POLICE OFFICER:

I felt that...

my soul left my body.

You know? Believe me.

I felt that something
left me, you know?

It came from here and then it left.

It's July 17th, 2022,

and it's the day before
I fly out to Chicago

to see my best friend Sania -
Sania Khan -

and we're going to move her home.

I'm really excited
about moving home, dude.

I'm really excited.

We're gonna drive a U-Haul
down from Chicago

and bring her into our home that
we rented and picked out together.

But anyways, babe,
I will catch you later.

Love you.

She's excited
to come back to Chattanooga

to start on a new foot.

I was on a high.

And I decide I wanna skate.

Sania's booked my flight.

I'm just getting
really giddy about seeing her.

Sania is sending me voice memos.

SANIA LAUGHS

She doesn't wanna pack.

She's way too excited,
she has way too much energy to pack.

Seeing Chicago from the aeroplane,

it was beautiful.

I get on the train
not knowing where I'm going really.

I know Sania lives in the main part

of downtown Chicago.

I'm a little nervous at this point.

It's not like Sania
to leave me hanging.

It really worries me.

I'm trying to call Sania

and I'm trying to sending, uh,

send her a message.

But, uh, she's not replying.

I'm sending messages
to Sania's phone

and I notice that her messages
are turning green instead of blue,

which on an iPhone means
that she's not getting my messages.

Either her phone is turned off,

not charged,
or they're not being read somehow.

Then I call my daughter, Eman.

I get a message from my mom.

She's worried that my sister's
not responding.

I just kind of brush it off, um,

because my mum is kind of known
to be a little over protective.

So, Gabriella
is currently on the train...

..and she sends me a screenshot
of a message

from Sania's sister that says:

"Do you happen to have Raheel's
phone number or Sania's address?

"It's an emergency."

And I'm thinking to myself,

"Why are people
talking about Raheel right now?

"Raheel's not supposed to be there.

"They're going through a divorce."

The point when a woman decides

to leave a controlling man

is the single most dangerous time

in that woman's life.

And that's the fear we have
on this night for Sania.

I call 911 here in Chattanooga,

they connect me to, um,
Chicago 911

and I try to tell them that,
you know,

I'm worried about my daughter,
I can't find her.

I get the call from my mom...

..and...
SHE SIGHS

..all I hear is just screaming
and crying from her.

That was the worst moment
in my life.

SHAZIA: We moved to Chattanooga
in 2001.

Sania was about eight.
Eman was four.

We loved the weather
and my kids loved Chattanooga.

Chattanooga, Tennessee
is a very small town

in the Southern region of Tennessee,

right on the border of Georgia.

This was in Atlanta.

Chattanooga
was Sania's favourite place.

She was a very cute,
friendly, kind of bossy kid.

She... she was the leader.

She wanted to lead.

She was happy, always dancing

and she always
wanted to be in front of the camera.

EMAN: Sania was everything
I wanted to be.

She was my first role model.

She was my first friend.

I would say that
she's, like, the opposite of me.

She's so extroverted.

She just saw the good in everything.

Honestly, I was so blessed
to have her as my sister.

I felt so proud to be her sister.

Sania and I met at school.

Immediately felt like a best friend.

I developed an interest
in playing in bands.

And in doing photography
for those bands.

She was also
getting into photography.

# Five, six, eight. #

She would take photos of me playing.

Sania was excitable.

She taught me
to let go a little bit,

and have fun and be a girl

and dress cute
and do all those things.

Sania was a little rebellious
at teenage years.

We struggled with her.

She wanted to wear
whatever she wants to.

Um, she wanted to go parties.

It's hard to raise South Asian kids
here in this society.

But we take our kids to the mosque,

we show them our culture.

Tinder was just becoming
a known thing,

and, um,
I had come home from work one night

and she said,
"Oh, I got on Tinder,

"you should make one too."
Cos we were both single.

And when she showed me Raheel

she said,
"And I think I actually like him.

"He's gonna go to medical school.

"He's got a great family".

And that's what she was looking for.

When she started dating Raheel,
um, she felt pretty excited

because she knew that her parents
were going to love him.

South Asians still view marriage
as a means for upward mobility,

safety and security,
particularly for the woman.

That's why when you meet somebody
who's perfect on paper,

say they were becoming a doctor,

they're the same religion as you,
even from the same community as you,

that's somebody
you wanna hold on to.

But Raheel was not what he seemed.

There was a bunch of lies and deceit

that he kept hidden
beneath the surface that was just...

..uh, matter of time
before it all came out.

POLICE RADIO CHAT

DISTANT SCREAMS

WOMAN: No, no, no, no!

Please!

Unlocked. Please.
PANICKED VOICES

Here.

In the beginning of December 2021,

Raheel was on medication.

He started getting very,
very stressed out

because of studying,
because of medical school.

I think he was not making
very good grades.

So they put him
on the anti-depressants.

He attempted to kill himself and her

by throwing them both out
the 20th-floor apartment.

'They then secure Raheel

'and then he was transported
to Northwestern Hospital

'where he received
in-patient treatment

'over the next three weeks.'

My very first impression of Raheel
was he's got aspirations,

he's brown,

he's handsome.

They have, like,
meshing personalities.

Like, everything
just seemed perfect.

Raheel had said
that he is from Alpharetta

which is just outside of Atlanta,
Georgia.

And it's-it's known
that people from that area

are upstanding families
and individuals.

Sania was not one to chase a man
because of his money.

But him presenting himself
in that light,

of course,
that looks comfortable

and that looks safe
for the long-term.

Sania was in Chattanooga,

Raheel was two hours away.

So the times that
they shared together were short

and based in fun.

SHAZIA: I'd met Raheel
and, um, he seems like a good boy.

Uh, he was respectful,
he was, uh, charming, happy

and he said
that he was gonna be a doctor.

He had two sisters, Mom,
he didn't have a dad and, uh,

most of all he knew Urdu.

Obviously he knew the culture.

We used to go to, uh,

amusement parks together.

And honestly, at the time,

um, I thought he was a good fit
for Sania.

In 2015, Sania graduated

with a double major
in women's studies and psychology

from the University of Tennessee
at Chattanooga.

But the one real passion
Sania had from when we were kids

was always photography.

TIA: The very first time I met Sania
was our first day of school.

And she talked
about how she loved photography.

She was planning on
doing it professionally.

I became a flight attendant

and I was just telling her

how she could be a flight attendant
and do photoshoots

at the same time.
She could do that everywhere.

So she ended up
being a flight attendant

and did that for a while.

She could travel and she could
have photoshoots with people

in all these different places.

And just live that adventurous life.

SHAZIA: And then she realised
that she wanna do photography

as a profession.

As she evolved in her photography,

she just got better
and better and better...

..and she was able to display that
on her social medias.

And she leaned
into South Asian weddings

and engagements and parties
and she just took off.

As a person of colour,
there's not much photographers

that even understand
how to take pictures

and get lighting and things right

for our skin tone.

So she really wanted
to focus on that

and it inspired a lot of people.

I knew of Sania,
I lived across the street.

I would see her around
doing photography at events.

I think with
the rise of social media

it's becoming way more common

for a woman
to become a photographer.

Especially within
the South Asian community.

She got into photography, TikTok.

Now, TikTok's a platform
where people can...

People realise that they can
get on it and be themselves.

They don't have
to put themselves in a box.

Some women, who are models,

actually prefer a woman
who's a photographer

rather than a male...
within the South Asian community.

Every single post would have...

It was, like,
basically a journal entry.

You could tell that
she spent her time writing those.

Part of Sania's personality

was being a very generous,
giving person.

A lot of people
safeguard their knowledge,

but Sania wanted to share tips
and tricks

and didn't see anybody
as a competition

or something to be beat.

I'm a make-up artist and Sania
was an incredible photographer.

And we were so excited
to create art together.

That was our dream was to travel
and do travel photoshoots.

It got to a point
where she realised, "Yeah,

"this could be my goal."

Then this could be
her long-term career.

During that time
Raheel was studying for the MCAT,

which is the big test
to get into medical school.

Romantically, personally,
things were still the same.

They're only having weekends away.

No big, firm plans for the future.

She was beginning
to ask him questions

about, "Well,
when are we gonna get married?"

And he would tell her,

"Oh, well, after I graduate
from medical school."

Or, "After I pass the MCAT."

But none of those things
were happening.

He wasn't able to pass the MCAT.

And Sania started
to doubt the future.

But it turns out Raheel's

not gonna be able to make
medical school.

He is going to settle instead

for a physician's assistant
programme.

She gave him the ultimatum

of we need
to take this next step forward,

and it seemed like he wasn't ready
to take that step so they had...

..a brief break-up.

And I believe that is when
he decided...

..that they
were gonna get engaged.

The ring?
Yeah, again.

In the video of the ring,

Sania was excited to have
this amazing future with him.

But the reality
of their relationship was...

was different.

The first time I knew
there was something going on

was when she wanted to talk
she was like, "Hold on..."

And would go outside
to talk on the phone.

So that's when I was noticing,

"Why? Why are you
leaving the room?"

She was like,
"Oh, I don't wanna bother him.

"He's studying or something."

But I said, "This is, like,
borderline controlling".

We were all hanging out
and he decided to FaceTime her.

And I just didn't love
the way he spoke to her.

It did feel like more of a check-in,

like, "Hey, what are you doing,
what are you up to?"

And there was a lot of red flags,
I would say.

In South Asian households

conflict arises when women are told
that even if there's, uh,

oppressiveness or abuse
within that household,

they're just told to tough it out
and stick with it.

Men are given
the sense of entitlement

over their female counterparts

because they're seen
as sort of this bread winner.

Despite everything,
shortly after the engagement

Sania throws herself into preparing
for that big, fat Pakistani wedding.

I wanted to have a good wedding
for my daughter.

So this is the house
where I lived five years and, uh,

it's a beautiful house.

And Sania did not want me
to do it.

But then I had no choice,
and obviously I had to downsize.

South Asian weddings
is a competition.

It's all about
who can throw the bigger wedding.

It always gets more grand
and extravagant and lavish.

The run-up to the wedding,
and she was just worried about

how the family's gonna behave
and everything.

It comes with a lot of stress
to plan these weddings.

And the last thing you want
is for anything to go wrong.

Her wedding was actually
the talk of the town.

Yeah, the wedding took place in, um,
Hyatt Regency, Atlanta.

It's right in the middle
of downtown.

She was so stressed out.

She was getting mad for no reason.

She thought that
everything's gonna be messed up.

The wedding itself,

it was the most beautiful thing
I have ever seen

in my entire life.

There were...
The lighting was so nice.

Flowers everywhere.

Her dress was gorgeous,

hand-crafted just for her, um,
shipped from overseas.

Everything was perfect.

But about halfway through

we see Raheel
stand up with his sword

and stamp it down into the ground

with a really, like,
mean, angry look on his face.

He liked to have a sword.

South Asian culture,
the groom have a sword.

Sania's dad was supposed
to be sitting next to her,

but her uncle
was sitting next to her.

And Raheel had some beef
with the dad and the uncle.

Raheel got really mad.

His eyes were, like, really, uh,
wide open and red and, you know,

and he was holding the sword

and he was just pushing it
up and down like this.

But then later on, Sania told me
that he was mentally unstable.

So he was not able
to control his anger.

So the move to Chicago
happened right after the wedding.

He got selected for Northwestern,
which is a very prestigious college.

They found an apartment
in the city area of Chicago.

She thought
it was gonna be the big dream,

but they were struggling
financially.

Didn't seem like they were
living the, the young, hip,

fresh couple in the city.

It didn't seem like that at all.

They started having problems
November, December of that year.

We would kind of FaceTime together

and Raheel was never there.

He was always, uh, studying
and Sania was always bored.

And lonely.

Several things were unravelling.

Sania is...
was massively independent

and was beautiful
at hitting her stride

and marching to the beat
of her own drum.

She was still wanting to wear
what she wanted to wear to go out

and have her successful business.

And for somebody like him
that'd be a very frustrating thing.

On top of the fact that
he's failing at his life goal

of becoming this upstanding doctor.

It all came to a head
when he hit a mental break

and attempted suicide.

RAHEEL: None of this is real.

SANIA: Yeah, he's been doing...
Oh...

Raheel tried to jump out the window

and he tried to either
take Sania with him or push her out.

I'm like, "If he's that crazy
you need to leave now,

"don't wait, get out of there."

OK, there you go, right there.

July 2022,

things between Sania Khan and her
estranged husband Raheel Ahmad

are coming to a head.

Sania is planning to move
out of her apartment in Chicago

and make the drive back home
to Chattanooga with her friend.

Raheel Ahmad visits his mother
in Alpharetta, Georgia.

His sister thinks that Raheel seems
a little depressed this day.

But he's been on his medication so
she doesn't worry about it too much.

This is the point
when Raheel lies to his family.

He says he's headed east to Virginia
for a hiking trip with friends.

But he does not go east,

instead he travels north
towards Chicago.

From social media, Raheel knew
that this was Sania's last night

in Chicago.

That meant that this was
the last night

that he could get to Sania alone
before she moved back to Chattanooga

and the safety net
of her family and friends.

Raheel's sister realised,
at noon on the 18th,

that he had stopped sharing
his location

through the Find My Friends app.

That Raheel is now in Indianapolis.

And Indianapolis is seven
to eight hours north of Georgia,

and three hours south of Chicago.

There's a lot of time
to think about it,

to pull over, to turn around,
to call somebody.

He had her wedding dress with him
and he had that gun in his backpack.

Based on
my prosecutorial background,

and there was no doubt
in my mind,

that when he made that long trip
from Georgia to Chicago

he had one intention in mind,

and that was to kill Sania.

Raheel was in the psych ward
after his suicide attempt.

Sania was still trying to make sense
of what just happened.

She was still in Chicago,
by herself, in the apartment.

I was very seriously
just begging her to,

"You've gotta get out of there.

"You need to leave,
you need to just come home."

This was a traumatic,
stressful thing,

but she also had a strong desire
to be a wife

and part of that wife role is
to be there to support your husband.

And I think she thought
that she was the only woman

who could help save Raheel.

She did go
and have a visit with him.

He confessed to Sania that
he had been cheating on her.

Even before they were engaged.

When she told me that
I was like, "What?"

Like, he cheated on you
before the wedding.

When he acted like
he loved you so much.

He had also lied about his age.

Initially, when matching on Tinder
it displays your age

and his age that was displayed
was similar to her age.

But it-it turned out
that he was lying about his age

from the beginning.

He made a fake profile of her,
a lesbian profile.

Using her images, posing as her,

trying to pursue women as Sania.

It was just really big moment
for her.

She was absolutely
considering divorce at that point.

How could you not?

Sania had actually seen me
going through a divorce

so she knew that, in our culture,
how divorce is perceived.

I've seen the backlash
from community.

She was double minded, you know?

She didn't know what to do.

But then she did make a decision

that she's not gonna be
living with him.

Sania had realised
she can actually be very vulnerable

and open about
your own personal life on TikTok.

She started talking about
her marriage,

her separation, her divorce.

People were connecting
with her message

in a way
that doesn't usually happen.

Not at least
in the South Asian community.

I just remember the first one
that blew up, and she was like,

"Dude, people are looking at this.

"That's crazy, like I just...
I made this."

She told me, "Jess, you know I was
gonna make photography content,

"but this is what the people want.

"So I'm gonna start making
divorce content, too."

People were saying,
"What is she doing?

"I mean, why is she so open
about her divorce?

"Why is she talking about it
so much?"

She became almost like
a motivational inspiration,

a rock star. Just super woman.

At one point, Sania's messaging
about her decision to leave

her abusive relationship was
getting to about a million people.

Her reach was incredible.

And she's a trailblazer
in this area.

Not only is she getting supporters
for her work

she's also drawing a lot criticism
from the community at this time.

She created a back-up page,

like a secret page
where she could be comfortable

that her family wouldn't find,
and she could be free to say and do

what she wanted on that page.

But somewhere down the line,
her family found the page

and they were disgusted with her,
to say the least.

When she was posting on TikTok
she was wearing, uh,

clothes that I don't approve of,
you know?

She always liked to get dressed up

and she wouldn't dress
incredibly scandalously,

but she would dress in a way
that showcased her assets.

You see women
from all walks of life,

South Asian women
from around the globe

starting to leave messages for Sania

thanking her
for the work that she's doing.

Thanking her for being brutally raw
and brutally honest.

After things had been
finally decided

that she was moving on,

she made the decision
to move back to Chattanooga.

When first she told me
that she's coming to Chattanooga,

I did not like the idea.

And I told her that it would kill me
if she had gone through

the same thing
that I had gone through.

I would be in so much pain.

Raheel came back to visit Sania

to maintain closure
of the relationship.

He did some sinister activity
around the house,

taking the keys,
taking her wedding ring.

So Sania no longer felt safe
in her surrounding.

It-it upset her, for sure.

Two months after the attack,
on February 8th,

she officially filed for divorce.

The moment that a woman decides
to leave a relationship

is the most dangerous time for her.

As a lawyer working with
abused women, I can tell you

Sania was doing everything
that she's supposed to do.

She got a restraining order,
she changed the locks,

and she got his name
taken off the lease.

But I really wanted her to leave.

She visited me in April.

We loved playing really loud music
and dancing,

and singing together all the time,
and we just had a blast.

We're going to be
travelling together,

we're gonna go to California
together.

We've so many photos from that,
that whole week.

It was probably the best week
of our lives.

The divorce has been filed for.

Part of that graduation to her
new life was getting her tattoo.

JESS: She got it
on her 29th birthday.

Roman numerals for 28,
to represent what she said

was the hardest year of her life -
her 28th year.

And also, um,
that she lived on the 28th floor

in her Chicago apartment building.

And meanwhile, Raheel Ahmad
is back home in Alpharetta, Georgia.

To Raheel, Sania's TikToks would
have been intensely provocative.

It's naive to think
that he would not see those.

MARIA: They're a direct
and public humiliation of him.

He's already given Sania a warning
with the attempt at murder/suicide.

He's shown that he is capable
of being an extremely dangerous man.

Face my fear. I never faced my fear.

REPORTER: Sania Khan was found dead
in her Chicago apartment,

shot to death by her ex-husband.

There's closed connection video

that captures Raheel Ahmad
walking through

the apartment complex front doors
at approximately 9.30am.

I told her, "Don't be alone
in that apartment

"cos that's where he used to live,
like, he knows your location."

As he enters the building,
he meets a rental agent

who's there to show him
different properties.

They enter the elevator.

Raheel's carrying
two suspicious items.

One's the backpack,
which we know carries the hand gun.

The second is a hang bag,
which has Sania's wedding dress.

He gets off the 27th floor.

He's told the real estate agents
that he was gonna stay

in the apartment complex
to see friends.

And what I notice,
as a prosecutor,

is that when he got off
the 27th floor elevator,

his backpack was behind him.

But then when he got
back on the elevator,

the backpack was now
in front of him.

And criminals try and make
their crimes as easy as possible.

Raheel wanted to put
the book bag in front of him

and then have the gun
easily accessible

so that when he got off
on the 28th floor,

made his way to Sania's apartment
and gained entry,

he could draw that weapon quickly
and hold her at bay.

In Alpharetta, Georgia,

Raheel's sister receives an email
from Raheel.

In it, Raheel says that he's
going to reimburse their mom back

for the money she spent
on his tuition.

Immediately she calls Raheel,

but when she can't get through
to him, she calls 911.

An officer in Alpharetta, Georgia,

pings Raheel's location
on his cell phone.

The cell phone ping itself
has limited accuracy,

but Raheel is within 200 feet
of Sania's address at the apartment.

BANG

That single gun shot was Raheel
shooting himself in the head.

As they gained entry, you can see
Sania's lifeless body on the floor

with a pool of blood near her.

Raheel is seated up with
a single gunshot wound to his head

and a gun in his hand.

Medical personnel responded.

He was transported, ultimately,
to the hospital

where he was pronounced dead.

GABRIELLA: I'm sitting on the train
into the city to see her.

We're going to move her home.

And a few of her friends,
they call me via Instagram.

One of them sounds
very, very scared.

She received a message on Instagram

from what we believe
is one of Sania's neighbours

saying how sorry she is
about our friend.

And, at this point,
we're all freaking out.

All of us.

We start googling stuff
because we-we want answers.

And we see that a news report
has come up on her block,

but not at her apartment,
reporting a shooting.

Sania's father... calls me.

He says, I think, something
in the deep part of my soul

that I kind of already knew
at this point.

He tells me
that there's been an accident

and that Sania has been shot
in her apartment.

I'm just counting the seconds
till I can get off of this bus

and just lose my mind and breakdown.

And I get off the bus
and I just collapse to the pavement

with my suitcase and everything
and I just... I'm crying.

And not a normal cry, just, uh...

..it was so, uh, I was so mes...

I am so messed up
that cars are stopping

and asking me if I'm OK.

And I'm not.

I get the call from my mom.

She, like, screams, "Sania's dead."

Like, we're all crying.

I felt that my soul
left my body, you know?

Believe me, I felt
that something left me, you know?

It came from here
and then it left from my body.

And all of a sudden I felt so weak.

I've never felt, ever, this before.

And I'm, like, so confused.

I didn't know what to do.

I was so alone
and I had to go to sleep alone...

..knowing that my sister...

..has gone
and, like, I couldn't do anything.

It's the worst day of my life.

Raheel left a suicide note.

I wanna read part of it for you.
He stated,

"I'd come to give her
the wedding dress and the gun

"for safety, since she was living
in Chicago by herself.

"She and I had a good time together
and laughed."

"And for dramatic effect,

"to convince her
to get back together,

"I just put the gun to my head
and said,

"What's the point of living
without you?"

"But she tried to take it away
from me, and it went off.

"I can't live with myself

"knowing me being here
caused this accident."

"I'm so sorry."

Sounds like bullshit.

MOLLY: There's no justice
to be had here

because he ended it for himself.

Makes me sick to my stomach.
It still does.

Massive amounts of anger
and frustration

of, "How could you?"

And the fact that he sat
in that apartment

for a while with her...

..I can't... I can't
wrap my head around it.

The question is why did he have
her wedding dress that day?

Normal reason would be he was gonna
use that token of their love

and wedding to try and rekindle
some type of relationship.

But my experience, as a prosecutor,
murderers often use tokens

or clothing
in order to mark their territory

or have some symbolic gesture
in their act.

And I thought to myself
that there's a possibility

that he wanted to dress her
in that wedding dress

after he had committed this
horrible crime of murdering her.

Um, but, uh, we'll never know.

After her death,
I went on her TikTok.

Comments were exploding.

All of a sudden it became,

"Why weren't we listening to someone
who was talking about her struggles

"and saying that she needed help,
was crying for help?"

And nobody... nobody listened
up until the point that she died,

and then everyone is saying,
"Why didn't we listen?"

Her message
is really connecting with women

and South Asian women
are flocking to her page

to share their experience

and to thank her
for sharing her story.

And these women
are from all walks of life

and from all across the world.

The whole thing went viral.

So, after her death,

me and several of
her other close friends,

um, decided that
we wanted to get something

that would bind us together
and also honour Sania.

So we all got the matching tattoo.

Many of her friends
got the same tattoo

that she had gotten,
which was on her arm.

Everyone got roman numerals - 28.

Except for me.

I got 29.

Because 29 was supposed to be
our year.

It was the year we didn't get.

Sania loved her mom so much.

No-one knows. She was
the best daughter, believe me.

She wanted me to be happy.

She didn't wanna die.

She wanted to live.

She was actually really excited
to be coming back to Chattanooga.

And, uh, she wanted to continue
her photography.

She wanted to find love again.

And me, Eman, we are
really proud of you, Sania.

We miss you.

Love you so much.

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