Yesterday, Saturday, an Egyptian court sentenced three people, including two doctors, to two years in prison, in the case that sparked widespread discontent in the country and was known in the media as the nurse and dog incident.
On September 14, the Egyptian Public Prosecutor, Hamada El-Sawy, ordered the referral of 3 defendants, two doctors and an employee of a private hospital, to a criminal trial on charges of "bullying" an elderly nurse who worked with the doctor.
According to the Egyptian media, the Cairo Economic Court sentenced the defendants to two years in prison and a fine of 100,000 pounds (about $6,000) each for convicting them of detaining and bullying the victim, knowing that this ruling according to Egyptian law is a preliminary ruling that can be appealed.
“God is great and pray for the dog.” Anger in #Egypt after a doctor insulted a nurse, and the Public Prosecutor orders an investigation pic.twitter.com/e3s76L5Nd2
- Al Jazeera Mubasher (@ajmubasher) September 10, 2021
According to a previous statement by the Public Prosecution, the three are accused of bullying a nurse by saying, displaying strength and controlling him, as they ordered him to prostrate to an animal (dog) owned by a doctor of the accused, taking advantage of his weakness (the nurse) and their authority over him with the intent of ridicule and degrading him, and they published through the information network a depiction of the incident bullying.
For their part, the defendants defended themselves according to what was stated in a previous statement by the Public Prosecution and local press reports, and said that they used to joke with the nurse and did not intend to offend him, while one of them said that his mobile phone was hacked before publishing the video clip.
Reactions to this incident began when pioneers circulated on social media platforms a 4-minute video clip of an elderly nurse in a private hospital who was forced by a doctor and staff to jump rope, and was punished by beatings for his failure, then forced to prostrate and apologize to the doctor’s dog.
The local media quoted the nurse as saying that the incident took place 6 months before it suddenly became public.