"The Shafia Family murders took place on June 30, 2009, in Kingston, Ontario. Shafia sisters Zainab, 19, Sahar, 17, and Geeti, 13, along with Rona Amir Mohammed, 50, (all Afghan origin) were found dead inside a car that was discovered underwater in front of the northernmost Kingston Mills lock of the Rideau Canal on the same day. Zainab, Sahar, and Geeti were daughters of Mohammad Shafia, 58 and his wife Tooba Mohammad Yahya, 41. The couple also had a son Hamed, 20, and three other children. Rona, who was herself infertile, was the first wife of Mohammad Shafia in their polygamous household.

On July 23, 2009, Mohammad, Tooba Yahya, and Hamed were arrested on charges of four counts of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder under the guise of honor killing. They were found guilty of all four counts by the jury in January 2012. The trial, which took place at the Frontenac County Court House, was believed to be the first in Canada conducted in four languages – English, French, Dari, and Spanish.

The trial garnered media attention in Canada for several months and raised the debate over Canadian values, honor crimes, and violence among Muslim groups.

The Shafia family left Afghanistan in 1992. From there they moved to Australia then to the United Arab Emirates for over a decade, where Mohammad Shafia had made a fortune in Dubai real estate. They immigrated to Canada and settled in the Saint-Léonard borough of Montreal in 2007.

In 1979 or 1980, Mohammad Shafia married Rona Mohammed, who was unable to have children. In 1989, he took Tooba Yahya to be his second wife in a polygamous marriage, and she gave birth to seven children, though Rona played a crucial role in their upbringing and raised the children as if they were her own. When the family immigrated to Canada, Rona was presented as an aunt. Except for Rona, the Shafia family practiced Shi'a Islam.

According to a family member's interview, Rona was trapped in an abusive, loveless marriage, trying in vain to convince her husband to grant her a divorce. Rona's siblings claimed that she feared for her life during the days leading up to her death. Tooba, the second wife, allegedly said to Rona “You are a slave, you are a servant.” Reportedly, the Shafias held all of Rona’s identity documents, including her passport, so Rona believed she could not flee to another country, where she had relatives. It was reported that Rona came to Canada as a domestic servant on a visitor's visa and the ""[visa's] renewal held over her head like an ax ready to fall"" by her husband and co-wife.

They also stated that the family's eldest daughter Zainab's relationship with a Pakistani boy was a source of much anger for her father, and they claimed to have overheard the father's threats to kill her.

With parents, Mohammad Shafia and Tooba Mohammad Yahya, and eldest son Hamed Shafia all in custody during the trial, the remaining Shafia children (two girls and a boy) were being cared for under social servi