From David Rusin at PJM (with thanks to Always On Watch):
Myra Morton approached her sleeping husband on the morning of August 5, 2007, with pain in her heart and a gun in her hand. Once the smoke had cleared at the couple’s upscale home just outside Philadelphia, a man would lie dead, a family secret would be exposed, and a spotlight would shine on the emergent phenomenon of Islamic polygamy in the Western world.
The slaying took place just hours before Jereleigh Morton was scheduled to leave for Morocco on a mission to impregnate his other wife, Zahra Toural. Niqab-clad Myra, a convert to Islam two decades earlier, acceded to his bond with the younger woman, whom he had met online in late 2006. Privately, however, the 47-year-old mother was shattered, recording her dismay in a journal and lamenting to friends that she no longer received attention. Myra even mailed a letter to immigration officials falsely claiming that Toural had terrorist ties and should thus be prohibited from entering the country. Her husband’s plan to conceive is apparently what sent her over the edge.
Islam did not kill Jereleigh Morton; Myra Morton did. She bears full responsibility for her brutal deed and should be punished accordingly. Regardless of the circumstances, murder is anathema to Western legal and moral standards. Yet so too is polygamy. Recent evidence, however, indicates that governments tend to look the other way as the conjugal mores of seventh-century Arabia — and the problems that travel with them — take root in our backyards. Just as Myra Morton faces justice in a court of law, these drowsy cultural watchdogs must be made to answer in the court of public opinion.
The prevalence of polygamy among Muslims living in the West remains a matter of debate. Here is a sampling of what has been reported: As many as thirty thousand Muslim families in France include more than one wife. There are fifteen thousand in Italy and several thousand in Great Britain. Estimates for the United States typically run into the tens of thousands. Even Australia has been forced to crack down on Muslim men looking to meet potential second wives via the internet.
Individual cases often come to light unexpectedly through high-impact media events such as the Morton saga. Another example is the tragic Bronx house fire that killed ten people on March 7, 2007. Moussa Magassa, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Mali who lost five of his children in the blaze, was discovered to have two wives living a floor apart. A subsequent investigation by the New York Times found polygamy to be an open secret in his immigrant community, with agencies that serve it adhering to a policy of “don’t ask, don’t tell.”
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