Freed British Nurse Cites Saudi Abuse
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LONDON — A British nurse convicted of murdering a colleague in Saudi Arabia said Thursday that she confessed to the killing only after suffering “violence, sexual abuse” at the hands of Saudi police.
Deborah Parry, 39, and Lucille McLauchlan, 32, had been in a Saudi prison for 18 months since their arrest in 1996 for the murder of Australian nurse Yvonne Gilford, 55. King Fahd commuted their sentences Wednesday.
Parry told the BBC that she confessed to the crime because Saudi investigators were “trying to burn my eyes with cigarettes, hitting me across the throat” during questioning in the city of Dhahran.
“At the end of about four or five days, it was easier to say that we had done it,” Parry said, adding that British Embassy officials were “turned away until we had confessed.”
Parry and McLauchlan flew into London on Thursday, where they faced a controversy over their decisions to sell their stories to British tabloids.
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