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צילום: גטי אימג' בנק ישראל
Egypt 'wife swap' couple jailed
Court sentences civil servant to seven years, schoolteacher wife to three years in prison for setting up swingers' club online, engaging in extra-marital sex. Couple's attorney says 'sentence very harsh, they are innocent'
A Cairo court has sentenced a man to seven years and his wife to three years for setting up a swingers' club, their lawyer told AFP on Sunday, in a case that has angered conservative Egyptian society.
Tolba Abdel Hafez, a 48-year-old civil servant, and his wife Salwa Higazi, a 37-year-old schoolteacher, were sentenced by the Agouza Criminal Court on Saturday, Ayman al-Saadi said.
Extra-marital sex is illegal in the mainly Muslim country where Islamic law is a principal source of legislation.
"They are innocent of this crime," Mr Saadi said. "The sentence is very harsh. Even people accused of apostasy have not received such harsh sentences." He said the pair would appeal.
The court said the couple had confessed to having sexual relations with three other couples, but Mr Saadi said they confessed only to "having a little fun on the Internet, not to having had sexual relations outside their marriage."
The case of the Cairo couple, who have children, is the first of its kind in Egypt and sent shockwaves through the strictly conservative country.
According to the court, the couple, arrested in October on prostitution charges, used the pseudonyms Magdy and Samira on a website and in emails to organise wife-swapping parties and orgies.
In sentencing the pair, the judge described the case as "one of the worst crimes committed," according to a transcript of the hearing.
"From a religious standpoint, it is one of the worst crimes possible," Mr Saadi agreed. "Who would offer his wife, the mother of his children, to another man unless he was insane? Even animals don't allow it."
Rights groups have criticised the 1961 law that can be used to prosecute suspects because it defines certain sexual acts as prostitution even if no money changes hands.
No date has yet been set for the appeal.
