British teenager accused of lying that she was gang raped in Ayia Napa faces being stranded in Cyprus until Christmas after the case is adjourned
- Briton, 19, was on holiday in Ayia Napa in July when she said she was gang raped
- She is on trial for making up the claim after cops said encounter was consensual
- Teenager says she was forced into retracting her claims by a ‘corrupt’ investigator, who made her afraid that she would be kidnapped or killed
- She pointed to statement written in ‘Greek English’, saying she did not write it
A British teenager accused of lying about being gang-raped in Cyprus faced fresh heart-ache today after learning she could be stranded on the island until Christmas.
The 19-year-old is fighting to prove she was raped by up to 12 Israelis during a working holiday in the party town of Ayia Napa in July.
She claims she was forced to sign a false statement confessing to inventing the brutal group sex attack by a police detective who she feared would kidnap and kill her.
The teenager (face covered), who has been charged with public mischief, arrives at court and is seen being supported by a close friend
The girl’s barrister Michael Polak arrives at court on October 17
The teenager has been charged with ‘making public mischief’ and faces a year in jail and a £1,500 fine. She spent four and a half weeks in jail before she was released on house arrest.
But she cannot leave Cyprus, had her passport confiscated, has been placed on a ‘no-fly’ list and lost her place at university.
The young girl was hoping her ordeal would come to an end this week, with a verdict delivered by a judge at the Famagusta District Court at Paralimni.
But the case was adjourned until November 1 when a British psychologist will give evidence via video link at the next hearing at Larnaca District Court.
The court will hear about the girl’s mental state as she claims she was suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome [PTSD] when she signed the statement retracting her claims that she was raped.
The bail conditions were not altered meaning the girl cannot leave Cyprus and must report every week at a police station.
The case could take up to another eight weeks to conclude leaving the girl stranded in Cyprus until December.
The young Briton, who is being support by her mother and legal pressure group Justice Abroad, has received almost £40,000 in donations in crowd-funding via a GoFundMe page.
Yesterday, the 19-year-old woman, who the MailOnline has chosen not to identify, broke down in tears as she was cross examined for more than three hours in the court room in Cyprus.
The teenager said she was forced by police to make a retraction statement 10 days later and she did so because she feared she would be kidnapped or killed.
Prosecutors say she willingly wrote and signed the document, which was shown to her at Famagusta District Court, in Paralimni.
The woman said about the letter: ‘This is not in proper English. This is in Greek English.
‘I’m very well educated. I’m going to university, I got an unconditional offer so there is no way I would write a paragraph like this.’
Her lawyers say she was told what to write by Cypriot police, led by Detective Sergeant Marios Christou.
‘It doesn’t make grammatical sense,’ the teenager said.
‘All the way through there isn’t one sentence an English person would write.’
Prosecutors say the woman told police she was attacked by 12 Israeli men while on holiday, but later retracted her claims
During three hours of questions, the teenager wept as she admitted lying to her mother in a text sent from the police station which said: ‘Trust me, I’m OK.’
State Prosecutor Adamos Demosthenos asked why she had not told her mother in these messages that she was in danger.
‘Your life is in danger and you were trying to calm your mother down?’ he asked.
The woman replied: ‘I love my mum. She is everything to me.
She said: ‘I think any child will lie to their parents to tell them they are OK because parents don’t stop worrying about their child.
‘If your child had just been raped by 12 Israelis and would not get out of bed, was taken to a police station for what turned out to be eight hours, I can tell you that you would be worried about your child.’
During the cross-examination, she added that she was being treated for possible infection to HIV following the alleged gang rape and was taking eight tablets a day when she was called in for questioning ten days later on July 27.
She said: ‘I was taking HIV tablets, antibiotics and anti-inflammatories. My neck was so swollen I could hardly breathe.’
The court heard she was taken for questioning at the Paralimni police station after detectives were allegedly given footage of the girl enjoying consensual group sex.
‘Marios told me he had videos of me having consensual group sex,’ the Briton told the court.
The woman initially claimed that she consented to sex with one boy who she knew at this hotel in Ayia Napa, before the rest of the group burst in and attacked her
The woman’s lawyer, Michael Polak, can be seen here giving a statement about the case earlier this month. He said that the 18-year-old had done well under intense cross-examination and answered all the questions without trying to avoid any
‘I asked to see them because it wasn’t true. He did not show them to me.’
The teenager said she suffered from PTSD after blaming herself for a horse riding accident after which the animal had to be put down. She said that she suffered similar symptoms following the alleged rape.
‘After it happened, even if a man was within a metre of me it would make me feel horrible, but they wouldn’t make me feel threatened for my life,’ she said.
She added that she was so scared by DS Christou’s style of questioning that she feared for her life.
‘In the police station and the way Marios [Christou] was approaching me and shouting at me to stop crying, I felt vulnerable.
‘I felt like I was in danger because he wasn’t going by the law, I wasn’t allowed a lawyer.
‘I immediately assumed corruption and conspiracy so I wouldn’t put it past him, I wouldn’t be surprised if at that moment he would have kidnapped me and killed me.’
The girl claimed that she was terrified that the British police in Cyprus might intervene and make things worse if she raised the alarm about how she was being treated in custody.
She said: ‘I feared that if … the British police [got] involved I would not be allowed out alive, because I was in fear of my life.’
As Judge Andreas Papathanasiou adjourned the hearing, the 19-year-old fled the court in obvious distress
Speaking outside the court, her legal team praised her bravery in the face of hostile questioning.
The woman said that she was being treated for a possible HIV infection for 10 days after the attack and that detective Marios had told her he had seen the video of the alleged rape
British lawyer Michael Polak said: ‘She was cross-examined for over three hours. She did very well. It’s not easy for anyone but she answered every question.
‘She did not try to avoid any of the questions asked of her during a long ordeal.
‘We say not only was her evidence convincing it is supported by the SnapChat evidence which show what was happening to her at the time.
‘One can only imagine how upsetting this would have been for an 18-year-old who was taken to a police station and kept there for eight hours.’
The teen denies causing public mischief by allegedly lying about the attack.
She could face up to a year in jail and a £1,500 fine if she is found guilty.
The 12 young Israeli men arrested in connection with the allegations all returned home after they were released.
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