[UPDATED with Afghan Marine Similarities:] Soraya Faroqi and Her Unborn Child, OC Homicides Nos. 64 and 67: Boyfriend Ahmad Siddiqi Held in Stabbing Deaths

UPDATE, DEC. 22, 2:12 P.M.: U.S. Marine Cpl. Ahmad Siddiqi cut a plea deal in an insurgent beating case last year that prevented him from being deported back
to his native Afghanistan, where he was sure the Taliban would kill him. If he's the same Ahmad Siddiqi sitting in Orange County Jail on double-murder charges right now–his age, appearance and military background match the Marine–he possibly faces the death penalty if convicted of stabbing his 24-year-old girlfriend and her unborn child to death Monday in Westminster.
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The Afghan Marine was identified in 2010 as 22 and with a unit–Weapons Company, 3rd Battalion, 8th Marines–based at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. The Ahmad Siddiqi held for the murder of Soraya Faroqi and her unborn child is described by police as 23 and from Alexandria, Virginia. The man in the booking photo that opened this post resembles the Marine in the copyrighted news photo that accompanies an online Marine Corps Times story on the case of the battered insurgent.

Staff
Sgt. Melvin Jones, the squad leader, and Cpl. Siddiqi were standing with a village elder in the Farah province on May 9, 2009, when two motorcyclists zoomed past, frightening the old man who ducked for cover. Siddiqi, who speaks Pashto, questioned the men, saying one threatened him. Siddiqi said into his radio, “Hey, you guys need to come beat this guy up,” an order he was not in position to give. Nonetheless, Cpl. Benjamin Turner and Lance
Cpl. Bryan Kolton walked up 200 meters and beat the fellow up.

Turner and Kolton did three months and five months in the brig respectively, were busted down a rank and faced discharge proceedings as a result of the attack, which they and Siddiqi were accused of trying to cover up.

A non-U.S. citizen
and one of only six Afghan Marines in the service at the time, Siddiqi negotiated a nonjudicial punishment that prevented a court martial, dishonorable discharge and possible deportation (and death). According to the Marine Corps Times, Siddiqi was set in August 2010 to plead guilty to two charges of lying and one of soliciting an offense–the equivalent of misdemeanors. He would not face discharge as he was getting out of the service the following month anyway.

The Ahmad Siddiqi accused of double murder this week was described by police as either an active or reserve U.S. Marine.

UPDATE, DEC. 22, 11:12 A.M.: Westminster Police have identified the 24-year-old woman whose boyfriend allegedly stabbed her to death Monday night as Soraya Faroqi.

Cops have also revealed there was a second victim: the Huntington Beach woman's unborn child. Ahmad Siddiqi,
23, of Alexandria, Va., and either an active or reserve U.S. Marine,
was charged Wednesday with the murder of both. He is being held without
bail pending his continued arraignment Jan. 11.

Siddiqi and Faroqi, who had been in a relationship for about a year, were at a Westminster residence around 9:15 p.m. Monday when they began arguing about something that prompted him to allegedly pull out a knife, chase her outside and into an apartment complex parking lot and stab her multiple times, according to the Orange County District Attorney's office.

She was later rushed to UCI Medical Center in Orange, where she was pronounced dead.

Siddiqi is charged with two counts of murder with special circumstances for committing multiple murders and
lying-in-wait, as well as a sentencing enhancement for using a knife in the commission of murder.

He faces life
in state prison without the possibility of parole or even the death
penalty with a conviction.

ORIGINAL REPORT, DEC. 20, 1:23 P.M.: Westminster Police received a call around 9:15 p.m. Monday that a woman had been stabbed by her boyfriend at an apartment complex in the 15100 block of Brookhurst Street.

When officers arrived moments later, witnesses directed them to bushes near a carport, where a bleeding woman was discovered on the ground.

First responders immediately administered CPR to her before rushing the 23-24-year-old woman to UCI Medical Center in Orange, where she was later pronounced dead.

The woman's boyfriend, Ahmad Siddiqi, 23, of Alexandria, Va., was still next to her in the apartment complex parking lot when police arrived. He was quickly taken into custody without incident. Charges against him have not been announced.

Here is what homicide detectives have pieced together so far: a man and a woman were loudly arguing about something before he chased her with a knife, caught her in the parking lot and stabbed her multiple times.

The woman's name is being withheld pending notification of next of kin. Police say she was a Westminster Huntington Beach resident.