Genenva: Tariq Ramadan, an Islamic scholar and former Oxford University professor accused of rape and sexual coercion, will likely face a three-year sentence, according to Swiss prosecutors who made the announcement on Tuesday.
Adrian Holloway, the lead prosecutor, told the three judges at the Geneva Criminal Court that it would be appropriate to impose a sentence of three years, divided into 18 months of imprisonment (to be served immediately) and 18 months of suspended prison time.
Ramadan disputes the charges. On Monday, the first day of his trial, he admitted to the judges that he had allowed his accuser to kiss him, but he insisted that they had no sexual relations.
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The complainant, a Swiss convert to Islam, requests anonymity because she claims to have received threats and goes by the name "Brigitte."
The complainant stated in a composed and assured tone that she thought Ramadan would kill her. "I was beaten... and raped," she claimed.
At the time of the alleged attack on October 28, 2008, she was in her 40s. Ramadan, 60, is accused of performing cruel sexual acts on her in a hotel room in Geneva while also abusing and beating her.
At Brigitte's request, a screen was set up in the courtroom so that Ramadan and Brigitte could not see one another.
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In order to sate his sexual inclinations towards the woman he treated as an object, Ramadan "acted." He didn't think twice about prolonging this nightmare for several hours, the prosecutor claimed.
Holloway emphasised the "consistency" of the complainant's comments and the psychiatrists' assessments.
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Ramadan, who is unpopular among secularists who view him as a proponent of political Islam, earned his doctorate from the University of Geneva with a thesis that was centred on his grandfather, who founded the Muslim Brotherhood movement in Egypt.
Before leaving Oxford University in November 2017, he served as a visiting professor of contemporary Islamic studies at universities in Qatar and Morocco.
At the height of the "Me Too" movement, rape allegations in France over alleged attacks between 2009 and 2016 forced him to take a leave of absence.