As established forensic psychologists and polygraph examiners the sentence imposed on a 19 year old young woman, in the Cyprus rape case, has quite frankly shocked us.
It is beyond credibility that any woman would agree to have sex with 12 males in succession or together, in the same room. It is even more incredulous that a judge would consider the retraction of her complaint as anything less than her being coerced.
Today she was sentenced to 4 months imprisonment, suspended for 3 years, and fined the equivalent of £125 for “public mischief”.
Cyprus rape case
This case hit the headlines in July last year when the young woman made a complaint against 12 Israeli males. She alleged that she had been raped by them in an Ayia Napa hotel room on 17 July 2019.
The 12 Israelis were arrested. However, many hours later after it is alleged that she and her friends were threatened by police with arrest, she retracted her complaint. This resulted in the men being released and allowed to fly home. The teenager was charged with causing “public mischief. Her holiday turned into a worse nightmare when she was incarcerated for a month before her lawyers were able to arrange bail.
In the ensuing prosecution it was alleged that she had falsely accused the 12 Israelis of raping her. She entered a plea of ‘not guilty’. Her trial began in early October 2019 but the verdict was delayed until December 2019. A forensic pathologist stated that the injuries she sustained were consistent with rape. She has always maintained that she was coerced into signing a statement admitting to lying about the incident.
The Israeli men
When these young men flew home to Israel they were welcomed with open arms but Israeli media and public opinion has changed over recent months. It is alleged that they have bragged about what they did.
Hebrew Union College Director of pastoral counselling, Doctor Ruhama Weiss, arranged for a delegation of Isrealis to fly to Ayia Napa to show support for the young woman, the Daily Mail reports. In a statement given to the newspaper he said ““The reason is that we are very much ashamed of what happened, and we want to say that not all Israelis are the same. We want to say to the British girl that we believe her and we want to say out loud that we are with her.”
However one of the accused, Yona Golub, is considering suing the teenager for compensation. It remains to be seen whether he does.
Repercussions
The young woman has her whole life ahead of her and now has a criminal conviction. This could affect her future immeasurably. It will be part of the reason that her defence team will appeal the sentence.
She was suffering from PTSD which doesn’t seem to have been fully taken into consideration by the trial judge, Michalis Papathanasiou. He did however, state that the case had “disturbed him”. He decided to “give her a second chance” which was reflected in the sentence he imposed.
There is no doubt that locals are worried about the potential loss of tourism brought about by the case. Her QC, Lewis Powell, said that the case would have “far reaching repercussions for women travelling abroad”.
We believe that the young Israeli men should take lie detector tests to eliminate any doubt as to their guilt or innocence. Do you? We would like to hear from our readers what their opinions are of the Cyprus rape case. We are currently running a Twitter poll to gather opinions so if you have a Twitter account click here to participate.
