After 3 months, the lawyers appealed the prison sentence I was released with Sara on bail of a thousand pounds each.

Alaa said they placed him in a “cage-like cell” overnight. He slept on a wooden plank, handcuffed, was not given food or water, and was escorted to the bathroom and not allowed to close the door.On the fifth day of his solitary confinement, the officers took him for another interrogation, this time with Hegazy, who was also detained for raising a rainbow flag at the same Mashrou’ Leila concert, and facing the same charge – allegedly “joining a banned group aimed at interfering with the constitution” and “inciting debauchery:” In the following accounts, some of the victims are identified with pseudonyms for their protection, indicated by use of quotation marks around the name in the case headings.

In August 2018, Adham said he was waiting for his friend in Cairo when two men dressed in civilian clothing surrounded him: They took me to Dokki Police Station, beat me so hard I lost consciousness, then threw me in a cell with other prisoners. They told them: “He’s a faggot” and told me “Careful not to get pregnant.” I stayed one week in that cell, and between the beatings by officers and assaults by other detainees, I thought I would not survive. Every day feels like a year. Everyone who enters here is scared of my [trans identity] and harasses me physically and emotionally. The police officers enjoy harassing me. They call me by the name on my ID. The women detained alongside me here tell the officers, “His name is Hossam.” The officers beat and torture these women to make them say that I did things that never happened. We sleep on a rotten and smelly mattress with no covers. The government only sends us bread. But all the food comes from visitors. If I don’t get visitors for three days, I don’t eat for three days. I was sitting in the car waiting for a friend of mine when ten men came out of the blue and started hitting the car and hitting me on the shoulder, asking for my ID, without even identifying themselves.

Duration:

I was verbally harassed and humiliated by the officers. One officer sexually harassed me, and one day, [the officers] pinned me down and shaved my head. She was then detained in al-Qanater Women’s Prison in Cairo. Police officers questioned her for 12 hours and repeatedly asked her if she was a virgin, she said. Authorities charged her with “joining a terrorist group aimed at interfering with the constitution” and detained her in a 3 by 2-meter cell with 45 other women. “The women had to beat and threaten each other to have space to sleep,” she said. Four officers then watched him take his clothes off while directing homophobic slurs at him, he said. They placed him in solitary confinement, claiming that it was for his protection: The band speaks mainly about the oppression of LGBT people in the Middle East and its lead singer, Hamed Sinno, is openly gay.