Legal And Non-Legal Responses To Australian Citizen Alicia Gali

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The legal and non-legal responses to situations have proven their effectiveness in the case of Australian citizen Alicia Gali’s unfair conviction in another country. The success of the legal and non-legal responses from both the UAE community’s perspective and Gali’s differ greatly due to the differing values and law systems.
Alicia Gali was an Australian citizen who took up a ‘dream job’ opportunity as a beauty salon manager in the Le Meridien Al Aqah Beach Resort in Fujairah. When spending an evening drinking at the hotel bar she last recalls one of her co-workers putting ice in her drink before waking up naked with broken ribs and massive bruising. Gali although admitting she had no memory of the night; her co-workers under oath claimed …show more content…

Since Gali had not finished her work at the hotel they refused to return her passport which led to her contacting an Australian consular officer in neighbouring Dubai. The officer gave Gali very little help, only advice of ‘considering the need to be in the country’ and no warning that unproven rape complaints could lead to sex outside marriage charges under the local law. Alicia was forced to sign a confession written completely in Arabic admitting to “sex without marriage, damaging honour, promoting sin and drinking alcohol”. She was sentenced under Article 356 of the Crimes Against Honour chapter in Sharia law to one year …show more content…

The Australian Government had requested Gali’s family to not publicize the case during her imprisonment, but at the time of Gali's release her criticism of the Australian consular service and her lawsuit against the Starwood hotel network gained international media attention. Her story being published in the Huffington post and a 30 minute documentary film in Yahoo! News Australia on the Sunday Night program was effective in informing the public on the risks of travelling to countries run under Sharia Law. The wide media coverage of the event had shortened Gali's imprisonment from one year to 8 months in March

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