What to Know
- Sara Seweid accused the NYPD of leaking private information and said sending her sister to jail would be "abhorrent" in a Facebook post
- She is the sister of Yasmin Seweid, the Muslim student who is accused of fabricating her story of being harassed on a New York City subway
- Yasmin Seweid was arraigned at Manhattan Criminal Court early Thursday
Sara Seweid, the sister of Yasmin Seweid, says jailing her sister for lying would be "violent and abhorrent."
In a post shared on Facebook Thursday, she accused the NYPD of leaking private information that her sister disclosed to them and lambasted the media for their coverage.
The elder Seweid didn't condone or defend her sister's actions, but she did assert that the police department is unconcerned about the safety of Muslim women.
"The NYPD doesn't care about us or our safety. Never did," she wrote. "You don't think calling for an 18 year old girl to be jailed for lying to be violent and abhorrent?"
The status was up for about an hour before it was deleted from her Facebook page.
Yasmin Seweid, 18, was charged with filing a false report after she told authorities three men called her a terrorist and chanted "Donald Trump" at her 23rd Street 4/5/6 subway station on Dec. 1. She was arrested Wednesday and arraigned at Manhattan Criminal Court early Thursday.
Sources told NBC 4 New York that Seweid allegedly admitted to police that she had been out drinking with friends and made up the incident to distract her strict father.
Local
According to Sara Seweid, multiple officers admitted they perused her family's social media accounts and told her "it didn't look good" that they were vocal about controversial issues.
She slammed reporters for falsely purporting that Yasmin Seweid was taken from the family's home in a stretcher Saturday — it was actually their mother who needed the ambulance, she said.
Seweid mentioned that her sister has dealt with "an insurmountable amount of violence and trauma" publicly and privately, and asked others to examine why Muslim women feel the need to lie about harassment.
"I really think people who are concerned about how future hate crimes will be dealt with need to take a step back and think why Muslim [women of color] have felt the need to do this," she wrote.
