Man who took indecent pictures of women at airport sentenced to 3 years in prison

CAIRO – 17 June 2021: Nozha Misdemeanors Court ordered, Thursday sentencing Cairo Airport employee who allegedly took indecent pictures of a woman, to 3 years in prison and to be fined of LE20,000.

The man has been accused of violating the woman’s private life, harassing her and taking pictures of her without her knowledge.

After the prosecution found inappropriate pictures of the victim on the man’s phone, he claimed he took them to show his superiors how “crowded” the area was. But the prosecution said in a Wednesday statement that the man, an employee at the airport who has not been named, is not allowed to take pictures inside the airport, and that the pictures were taken in a place that is not covered by surveillance cameras.

Similar pictures of other women were found on the phone. However, he claimed he did not know how those pictures were on his phone. The prosecution said it arrived to the conclusion that he took pictures of women behind their back for his own sexual gratification.

On Tuesday, an Egyptian young lady posted on her Instagram that she was subject to non-physical sexual assault at Cairo International Airport, when she saw a man taking photos of her and other female passengers from the back.

In tears, Basma (identified on Instagram as a blogger, and under the name Bee Bishay) took a video at the airport saying that her flight from Beirut landed in Cairo Monday, and she was collecting her baggage when a friend spotted a man taking photos of Basma from her back.

Bishay confronted the man who denied the incident, and refused to show up his phone. She then took him to the airport security men to prove his assault.

Inside the room, there were a number of men, whom she thought at first to be police officers; she was frustrated as they seemed unhelpful and were only checking the pictures on the man's phone, according to her video, in which she blamed officers for not doing their job.

Four hours later, she posted another video on Instagram saying that the men in the room were neither police officers nor airport security, and that the “real” police officers intervened and were very helpful, and that they investigated the man for a long time, before he was finally handcuffed and arrested.

 “Actually I cannot remember what I said [in the first video] because I was very angry.. my sister told me that I generally blamed police officers and major generals as not doing their job, but in fact, what happened is that the men in the room were not police officers and I thought they were,” she said.

 Bishay continued, “lots of interrogations were conducted [with the assaulter].. like 20 pages were written on the incident,” she said in the second video. “We have seen a huge support from [the police officers] … and when I thanked them at the end... [the police officers] said they have just done their job.”

Bishay added that the officers took a good care of her and that she is very grateful for their help. "I just want to say I am really sorry for what I said earlier."

 Bishay’s airport videos garnered hundreds of thousands of views, and huge support from her followers and Instagram users, who kept sharing her footages.