A United Arab Emirates court sentenced Marte Deborah Dalelv to 16 months in prison for having sex outside of marriage after reporting her rape by a coworker.
"I have to spread the word. ... After my sentence we thought, 'How can it get worse?"' Dalelv told The Associated Press , the New York Times reports.
Dalelv will appeal her conviction in September.
She worked for an interior design firm owned by Janet Jackson’s husband, Wissam al Manna. She alleges that she was raped by a coworker during a meeting in Dubai in March. She fled to the hotel lobby after the rape and asked the staff to call the police.
The staff asked her if she really wanted to involve the police.
"Of course I want to call the police," she told the New York Times .
That is when her legal troubles began.
Local officials detained her for four days. Having sex outside of marriage is illegal under Islamic law, but the law is seldom enforced against Westerners.
She called her stepfather in Norway while she was in prison and asked him to call the local Norwegian consulate to help her. She has been released but must stay at a local Norwegian Christian Center while she waits for her appeal.
Officials in Norway are supportive of Dalelv.
"We believe this is a completely unacceptable verdict, which is contrary to human rights and the basic sense of justice," Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide told
Rueters.
Image: By haitham alfalah, via Wikimedia Commons