The Supreme Courtroom of Cyprus on Monday overturned the conviction of a British girl accused of fabricating claims {that a} group of Israeli vacationers raped her in a resort room in Cyprus.
In 2019, lower than two weeks after the lady informed the Cypriot police that as many as a dozen Israeli vacationers had raped her, she was arrested on prices of creating a false accusation. Her case drew widespread consideration within the British and Israeli information media, and he or she was convicted and given a four-month suspended sentence.
Lewis Energy, the lady’s lawyer, mentioned in an interview on Monday that the choice was a watershed second for victims of sexual assault and that his consumer had acquired the justice she deserved. The Supreme Courtroom had dominated that faults within the girl’s trial have been adequate cause to overturn her conviction, he mentioned.
He mentioned the lady, who was 18 when she first went to the police, and her household have been “completely delighted” and relieved by the choice.
Mr. Energy mentioned that the native Cypriot police had botched the primary investigation and that he would press them to reinvestigate her allegations of rape. He mentioned that his consumer had not had entry to a lawyer whereas she was questioned by the police and that the authorities had pressured her to withdraw her claims.
Neither the lady nor these accused have been named due to their age and press restrictions set by the Cypriot authorities, he mentioned.
In line with Mr. Energy, the lady says that she had been having a vacation romance with one of many Israeli males, whom she had met within the Cyprus resort city of Ayia Napa. She mentioned that she had agreed to return to his resort room, however that shortly after they acquired there, his mates entered and took turns raping her.
Nir Yaslovitzh, a lawyer who represented a number of of the Israelis accused within the case, mentioned in a press release on Monday: “My purchasers stand behind the declare that the criticism made towards them was a false criticism, and due to this fact my purchasers usually are not troubled by the court docket’s ruling in Cyprus. The truth that the court docket accepted the enchantment factors to shortcomings in her personal trial, and never that my purchasers are responsible.”
Yaniv Habari, an Israeli lawyer based mostly in Cyprus who additionally represented a few of the Israelis concerned, mentioned in a phone interview that he didn’t see the police in Cyprus reopening the rape case in gentle of Monday’s ruling.
“The judgment doesn’t imply that she was raped or not raped, or that her testimony was credible or not credible,” Mr. Habari mentioned of Monday’s choice. “The Supreme Courtroom judges didn’t reverse the judgment on the premise of her having been raped, however merely on the premise that she was not given a good trial.”
In 2019, Mr. Yaslovitch informed the information media that video clips made by a minimum of one of many Israelis had contradicted the accuser’s account. He mentioned that when the investigators confronted her with the video and different inconsistencies in her testimony, she might provide no rationalization.
After the preliminary allegations have been made in 2019, legal professionals for 3 of the detained Israelis mentioned that DNA exams indicated that their purchasers had had some type of sexual contact with the lady. Their purchasers mentioned the encounter had been consensual. It was not clear how or whether or not the opposite 9 Israelis who had been suspects have been concerned.
The case drew widespread consideration from information media and girls’s rights organizations, who expressed outrage over how the police had dealt with the lady’s allegations and handled her through the investigation. In Israel, a lot of the response to the case revolved round issues of sufferer shaming and societal pressures for younger males to show their masculinity.
Supply: NY Times
