A Syrian refugee has been arrested in Egypt and sentenced to a year in prison for allegedly being gay. The charges relate to sexual debauchery after an undercover police officer set up a fake date online with the man.
“The case contained lots of null procedures, like the arrest itself,” Ahmed Hossam, the lawyer for the man, told Egypt Independent . “There wasn’t a crime in the first place. The crime was in the imagination of the officer himself. No debauchery happened. Second, sending personal messages is unconstitutional? Searching an innocent person isn’t allowed according to criminal procedure code in Egypt.”
The police officer had set up a variety of social media accounts posing as a gay man. He then chatted with the Syrian refugee, lured him out under the pretense of a date and arrested him upon arrival. The police officer then provided the chat history and related information to the public prosecution to convict the man.
While the man was held in custody, he was forced to undergo a barbaric anal examination, a medically unfounded test that supposedly proves homosexuality. Though Humans Rights Watch and the medical world proved that not only is this test medically unfounded, but this vile and horrific test is an act of torture.
Nevertheless, the test was conducted and though the forensic doctor stated that there is no evidence to conclude that the victim was in fact homosexual, he was still charged with "solicitation to commit an immoral act in public," "debauchery" and "habitual debauchery".
The man's lawyer has appealed the verdict and the following court date is on July 8th.
This latest arrest comes as a part of an ongoing crackdown on homosexuality in Egypt that stepped up significantly after the military overthrew President Mohammed Morsi.
Dating app Grindr has turned off location information in Egypt, along with several other countries, in a bid to block police from using the app to locate and arrest its users.
In a country dealing with severe economic issues and security threats, Egyptian police cracking down on the most marginalized members of society should be a crime in and of itself.