Saudi sex braggart will go free - lawyer

CONTROVERSY: The LBC show Bold Red Line has caused a storm in the Kingdom.

The lawyer representing Mazen Abdul Jawad, the man sentenced to five years in jail and 1,000 lashes of the whip for revealing intimate details of his sexual exploits on Saudi television, is confident that an annulment of the sentence “is only a matter of time”.

Jawad’s sentence was upheld by the Appeals Court on Monday. However, his lawyer Solaiman Al-Jumai’i said that he was satisfied that the sentence could be overturned if new evidence came to light.

According to daily newspaper the Saudi Gazette, Al-Jumai’i issued a press statement Tuesday in which he said he and his client “intend to wait on Ministry of Culture investigations”.

“We have presented to the ministry [of Culture and Information] with proof of LBC’s distorting and dubbing and reediting of footage, and its contravening of Ministry of Culture regulations, and we have received assurance in a response from the ministry that it will take pertinent measures,” the statement said.

The Appeals Court also upheld the sentences of three of Jawad’s companions who took part in the LBC programme the Bold Red Line, broadcast in August last year. Each was given two years’ prison and 300 lashes, the newspaper said.

A fourth person, a cameraman from Jeddah Television Center, had been given a sentence not open to appeal of three months in prison and 70 lashes, it added.

On the show, filmed in his Jeddah bachelor's apartment, he talked about picking up women and displayed sex aids and toys on camera.

The episode, viewed many times on YouTube, outraged many in the conservative Islamic kingdom and led to his arrest on July 31 last year.

Print | Email | Discuss this article

| Share |

READERS' COMMENTS

Click here to post a comment

Add your Comment All posts are sent to the administrator for review and are published only after approval. ArabianBusiness.com reserves the right to remove any comment at any time for any reason. Please keep your responses appropriate and on topic. Arabian Business would like to point out that only comments relevant to the story will be published. Any containing personal insults or inappropriate language will not be approved.
Name *
Remember me on this computer
Email *	(Your email address will not be published)
City
Country
Subject *
Comment *
Notify me of further comments
Enter the words above *
Please click post only once - your comment will not be published immediately.

MORE FROM ARABIANBUSINESS.COM