Sexual assault by police officers

Nawal, 29, also told Human Rights Watch she was sexually assaulted by police. In July 2012, Nawal was arrested by a military police officer late at night in the Ashrafieh district of Beirut following an altercation with a man who was harassing her. She said she was taken to the military police station in the Mathaf area, where the officers found she was carrying pills without a prescription. She was kept overnight at the military police station because, they told her, there was no space available at the Hobeish police station, where she was supposed to be transferred. The next day she was taken to Baabda police station, where a police officer sexually assaulted her. She said: At the time there was only one police officer at the station. He asked me if someone had searched me and led me by the hand next to the bathroom. He ran his hands all over me, put them inside my bra and my underwear, and forced his fingers inside me. I feel ashamed, but I was too scared and weak to protest. Later, when the shift changed, another police officer followed me into the bathroom when I went to wash my face. He cornered me and took off his pants and forced me to touch him. I was crying but did
as he said.