Cairo, Egypt – An Egyptian appeal court decided Saturday to go on with a retrial of the head of Egypt’s small Jewish community rejecting her appeal to stop the process, judicial sources said.
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Carmen Weinstein, 82, was convicted in July by an Egyptian court for three years in prison and a fine and restitution totaling more than US$8,000.
She denied the charges and said that the documents supplied as evidence were false.
Her lawyers later appealed the retrial.
On 30 October, an Egyptian court annulled the sentence, ruling that Weinstein to be re-tried before a new court.
A judicial source said that Heliopolis Appeal Court ordered Saturday that it has the jurisdiction to conduct the re-trial.
Weinstein told Al-Masry Al-Youm that she will re-appeal Saturday’s ruling again at a higher court.
She did not show up in the trial.
Under Egyptian law defendants in civil cases can send their lawyers instead.
Israeli media had earlier reported that Weinstein had fled Egypt to the United States after being convicted of fraud and ordered to prison.
But Weinstein denied that she had left Egypt or she was on hiding.
“The media reported that I fled to America in some cases, or that I escaped to Australia in other cases, but the truth is that I never left Egypt,” Weinstein said.
Weinstein was convicted of selling an Egyptian businessman a Jewish community building that did not belong to her and then refusing to return his money.
Weinstein has said documents proving she had sold the building for 3 million Egyptian pounds, or US$520,000, were forged.
Weinstein heads a Jewish community of only dozens of members, most of whom are women.
Israeli newspapers have reported that Tel Aviv advised its embassy in Cairo to avoid interfering in the case.
In the USA, once someone has been acquitted of a criminal charge, they cannot be retried for the same crime. However, in autocratic societies (such as Egypt), if the powers in charge don’t like a particular verdict, they can appeal to a higher court, and request a retrial.
In the USA, too, if the prosecution is not happy with a jury verdict, they can appeal. But in most cases, for practical reasons they don’t. But in Egypt, it’s a different ball game. They can’t fathom letting a Jew off the hook. So, if the first court cleared her, they will retry her as long as she will be found guilty and put in prison.
I was in Egypt 6 months ago. There are plain clothes police EVERYWHERE. I didn’t realize what a police state it was until I saw this. I tried to talk to a Jewish man that I met. While we were talking the police stood right next to us. When I came back later to try to resume the conversation I saw such fear in the man’s e yes that I just walked away.
It is not only the Jews there, but the general Egyptian population that is deathly afraid of these police.
This is probably all a show trial for domestic consumption to keep the locals calm with regard to matters involving Jews.