![A 24-year-old Egyptian Mariam Salah [RadwaElSherbiny/Twitter]](https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Mariam.jpg?fit=1200%2C787&ssl=1)
The Cairo Criminal Court has sentenced two people to death following the death of a woman in Maadi who was killed by a group of men after they sexually harassed her.
Mariam Saleh, 24, was walking home from work when three men sexually harassed and catcalled her. When she tried to escape, one of them grabbed her handbag and as the van accelerated, she was dragged behind the vehicle.
Her body was later found covered in fractures and wounds from being dragged under the wheels of the van and then hitting a parked car.
Almost immediately, Egypt’s prosecution ordered the arrest of three men accused of harassing, dragging and killing a woman in Cairo’s Maadi suburb.
The Public Prosecution released a statement to say that Mariam was the victim of a theft gone wrong, despite accounts to the contrary.
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This year, a sexual harassment and abuse crisis has rocked Egypt as hundreds of women have come forward to share their experiences in a society which often punishes the victims and treats perpetrators with impunity.
Over the summer nine men were accused of drugging and raping a woman at the luxury Fairmont Nile City Hotel in 2014, filming it and then using the footage to blackmail the victim.
The Fairmont rape was exposed after an AUC student Ahmed Zaki was charged with indecent assault of at least three women. After his arrest, hundreds of women spoke out on social media in what has been dubbed Egypt’s #MeToo movement.
Several TikTok women are being prosecuted for allegedly violating family values and debauchery in what has been interpreted as a crackdown on social media influencers and women.
This week, one of these women was accused of receiving funds from Israel.
Rights groups regularly speak out about the alarming number of death penalties that have been issued in Egypt under the current regime.
READ: As executions rise in Egypt, veteran hangman says he entered Guinness World Records