her on a public bus was with her family Tuesday, October 10. Laurence Wagih Emil, 15, reportedly escaped the ground-floor room where she was being held in Cairo’s southern Helwan suburb at 10 pm last Tuesday,  October 3,  while her captors were away breaking their Ramadan fast.

They had threatened to rape her and convert her to Islam if her family did not leave their Nile Delta city of El-Mahala el-Kobra, said Compass Direct, a Christian news agency.

Her father, Wagih Emil, had apparently received several threatening text messages from his daughter’s mobile phone. "Take the rest of your daughters and leave the city, or you will lose them one by one," said one. "The girl is not accepting easily, but she will embrace Islam for sure."

STATE SECURITY

Before family members recovered her, State Security Investigation officials interviewing Laurence Wagih Emil allegedly told her she would never see her parents again unless she reported a false story denying the kidnapping. 

The girl arrived at the police station after asking Helwan area residents to help her contact her parents in El-Mahala el-Kobra, 100 kilometers (60 miles) north of Cairo.

Earlier that day, El-Mahala el-Kobra’s Christian community staged a demonstration, 1,000 strong, to demand Emil’s immediate recovery.

The girl’s aunt and uncle, residents of Cairo, immediately drove to Helwan to locate her, but they were forced to wait at the police station where officers were friendly and offered her a sandwich and a soft drink.  But 15 minutes later, she said, she was unable to move though fully conscious.

FALSE TESTIMONY

"You should say that you took the bus to Tahrir Square [located in central Cairo] and met a guy named Fady, who took you to sleep at his house with his mother," Emil was quoted as saying police told her. "Say that; otherwise you won’t see your parents again."

After Emil had regained use of her limbs, police had her sign a statement that she had met a male friend in Cairo and spent the night at his house, Compass claimed. She was then reunited with her family. There was no immediate reaction from police officials.

"Laurence was in an awful state," said Helwan lawyer Nader Amrousi Saleh, who was reportedly with Emil when she signed the statement at the state prosecutor’s office. Saleh told Egyptian weekly Watani, “We wanted her out. She’s fine now."

The escape of the girl has raised questions over police reluctance and even involvement in kidnappings of Christian girls across Egypt. Some of them marry Muslims, and even convert to Islam, to escape poverty, human rights groups say.

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