Oklahoma woman sought in stabbing of daughter, endangering another

(Reuters) - Police in Oklahoma launched a nationwide search on Tuesday for a woman they said repeatedly stabbed and critically wounded the eldest of her three young daughters and left her in their burning house before making off with the youngest girl.

Taheera Ahmad, 39, began stabbing her 11-year daughter on Monday evening after binding and gagging all three of her girls at their home in Tulsa, police said. During the stabbing, the middle daughter, a nine-year-old, escaped to an aunt's house nearby with the help of her eight-year-old sister, they said.

Investigators believe that Ahmad, who has previously lived in Texas and Tennessee, fled with the eight-year-old girl in a black Lexus, Tulsa police spokeswoman Jeanne MacKenzie said.

"We're looking for this mother and this child, still," MacKenzie said in a phone interview. "We're getting out as much information as we can, hopefully to find everybody and make sure everybody's safe."

Ahmad's 11-year-old daughter who had too many stab wounds for officers on the scene to count, was in critical but stable condition after surgery Monday night, MacKenzie said.

The nine-year-old who escaped told police her mother bound the three sisters' hands with duct tape and stuffed their mouths with socks, MacKenzie said. After the nine-year-old made her way to her aunt's home, the aunt went to the house where she discovered the stabbed 11-year-old girl and a fire in the kitchen, which she put out, she said.

(Reporting by Peter Szekely in New York; editing by Susan Thomas)