British teen could face prison after Cyprus court finds her guilty of lying about gang rape claim
A 19-year-old woman was convicted on a charge of causing public mischief after prosecutors proved she lied about being gang raped in the Cyprus resort town, Ayia Napa. The young teen could serve a year in prison. Her sentencing is scheduled for early January.
Protesters are calling for the boycott of Cyprus over its Monday verdict that a British teen had fabricated her claim that a dozen Israeli men gang-raped her at a hotel last summer.
The 19-year-old’s mother, who is backing the boycott, told the BBC Wednesday that Ayia Napa, the resort where her daughter claimed she was raped, is unsafe for travelers.
Protesters stage a demonstration outside a court house in Paralimni, Cyprus, on Monday, December 30, 2019, in support of a 19-year-old British woman who was found guilty of fabricating claims that she was gang-raped by 12 Israelis. (AP)
The woman told investigators she was raped by a dozen Israelis aged 15to 20 on July 17. Cyprus police said she retracted the allegations 10 days later after investigators found what they said were inconsistencies in her statements.
She spent a month in jail before being bailed out in August. In the ensuing trial, she said pressure from Cypriot police forced her to change her account, telling a judge she was “scared for my life.”
Her lawyers have argued that she signed a statement retracting the rape claim with no lawyers present and after eight hours of a police interrogation that was never recorded – both of which are a violation of EU community law, The Guardian reported.
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On Monday, a Cyprus judge found her guilty of the charge of “public mischief,” which carries up to a year in prison and the equivalent of a $1,900 fine.
The lawyer for some of the 12 Israelis accused by the woman welcomed the ruling. But the decision stoked outraged in the U.K. with calls on social media to boycott Cyprus, which relies heavily on British tourism.
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Cypriot prosecutors, meanwhile, maintain that prosecutors established the woman’s guilty beyond any reasonable doubt.
Kyriakos Kousios, a government spokesman, told The Guardian that although he sympathizes with the woman’s mother, Cyprus is “not happy with the extent of publicity and the reaction, which has been exaggerated.”
“We would have wished that these [boycott] calls hadn’t happened,” he said.
The woman’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for next Tuesday.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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