The Egyptian prosecutor announced that seven of the accused in the Fairmont rape incident have escaped Egypt and the prosecution of two others continues. According to a statement made by the prosecution, the defendants left the country via Cairo Airport, on different days at the end of July, days before the victim submitted an official report to the National Council for Women and the prosecution began its investigations into the case.
The prosecution indicated that it had included the defendants whose data were available on the travel ban and anticipated arrival lists, upon receiving the report, and then listed the rest when their data was available. The prosecution considered that publishing the defendants’ photos and names on social networks were what pushed them to flee before the investigation began.
Activists and human rights defenders believe that the social media campaign about the Fairmont Nile City Hotel crime was the main reason the investigation began, especially since the case was kept secret for many years. The case was made public late last month through the Assault Police Instagram page, which had previously adopted a campaign against Ahmed Bassam Zaki, who is currently imprisoned on charges of harassment and sexual assault of dozens of women.
The page requested other testimonies and information from witnesses about the Fairmont incident. It was closed down after the administrators received death threats. Other pages supporting the case also tried to circulate the story. According to the testimony, in 2014, at least six people drugged a girl, took her to a hotel room, took turns raping her, wrote their names on her body, and then filmed the incident and shared it among themselves and their acquaintances.
