STERLING, Va. -- About 5,000 mourners attended Wednesday's funeral of a Muslim girl whose beating death, blamed by police on a motorist's road rage, has some people in her community fearing for their safety.
Some wearing Islamic robes, others in street clothes, left their cars as traffic backed up, and walked more than a mile to reach her mosque.
Nabra Hassanen, 17, was remembered as a shining example of kindness and openness during the services.
"There is nothing like losing a child, especially in the way that we lost Nabra," said Imam Mohamed Magid, the religious leader of the All Dulles Area Muslim Society. He stood before Hassanen's closed coffin, covered by a black shroud decorated with quotes from the Koran.
Police said Hassanen was bludgeoned with a baseball bat early Sunday by a motorist who drove up to about 15 Muslim teenagers as they walked or bicycled along a road. Police said the driver became enraged after exchanging words with a boy in the group.
A Hassanen family spokesman said the girls in the group were wearing Muslim headscarves and robes.
Magid said he sought to comfort the victim's mother by telling her that a person who dies in such a manner will enter paradise with no questions asked.
He acknowledged that the slaying has people grieving and fearful, but he praised the many people who turned out "in a fever" to search for the teen before police discovered her body Sunday afternoon.
While waiting for a vigil after the teen's funeral and burial, Fairfax County Police Chief Edwin Roessler Jr. spoke about the community's concerns.
Roessler said police have "absolutely no evidence" that her killing was motivated by hate, but he acknowledged that many people still strongly feel that it must have been a hate crime. Virginia law defines these, in part, as crimes that try to intimidate or instill fear in people targeted for their race or religion.
"That's the myth, isn't it?" the chief said.
He urged anyone with evidence that Hassanen's killing was motivated by hate to come forward, and "if evidence develops of a hate crime, I promise we will charge to the highest levels."
Roessler also said police are waiting on the results of forensic tests on her body, which was pulled from a pond on Sunday, in an attempt to determine whether Hassanen was sexually assaulted.
"We're doing a thorough investigation and that's something of concern to us," he said.
Darwin Martinez Torres, 22, is currently being held on a second-degree murder charge. Police said he beat her with a baseball bat early Sunday, drove off with her in his car and assaulted her again -- they haven't said how -- before dumping her body in a pond near her home. His public attorney has declined to comment.
At her funeral on Wednesday, an overflow area itself overflowed with people who attended in solidarity.
The crowd overwhelmed suburban traffic, and cars jammed into neighborhood streets more than a mile away to park.
Most mourners were Muslim, but Christians and Jews attended as well. The All Dulles Area Muslim Society Center, one of the largest mosques in the country, has a long history of interfaith outreach and activism, and its board chairman, Rizwan Jaka, said there has been "just a tremendous outpouring of support" from people of all faiths.
Information for this article was contributed by Alanna Durkin Richer and Sarah Rankin of The Associated Press.
A Section on 06/22/2017