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Zina's Murder Juvenile Justice Crisis · Crime Night

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: The years twenty thirteen. The setting is Port, said, a
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  Speaker 1: vibrant port city right on the Mediterranean coast of Egypt.
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  Speaker 2: And we're high up on the eighth floor of an
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  Speaker 2: apartment building. This is a place filled with families who
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  Speaker 2: are really close knit. There's this profound sense of security.
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  Speaker 1: Right. This is home to Xena. She's five years old,
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  Speaker 1: and she's known around the entire neighborhood simply as the
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  Speaker 1: Angel of Port said.
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  Speaker 2: She was just beautiful, so playful and sociable, and her
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  Speaker 2: family they were really pillars in this community, known for
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  Speaker 2: being generous kind. I mean, the trust in that building
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  Speaker 2: was absolutely.
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  Speaker 1: And that trust, that feeling of safety, that's exactly what
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  Speaker 1: makes what happened next so devastating.
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  Speaker 2: It's around nine zero zero pm, a total normal evening.
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  Speaker 2: A private tutor has just shown up for Zena's older brother.
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  Speaker 1: And Xena, being five, is getting a little restless.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. She asked her mother if she can go
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  Speaker 2: play just outside the apartment door. It's open. She can
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  Speaker 2: see her cousins other kids from the building right there in.
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  Speaker 1: The hallway in this kind of environment. That's a perfectly
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  Speaker 1: normal request.
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  Speaker 2: Right, Oh, completely, it happens every day So she's out
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  Speaker 2: there playing visible from the door, and a couple of
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  Speaker 2: neighbors come by. Okay, they're looking for a lighter, and
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  Speaker 2: they just had a new baby. So Xena, you know,
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  Speaker 2: she's eager to help and she wants to see the infant.
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  Speaker 2: So she goes with them just for a moment, just
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  Speaker 2: down the hall right. She's with them for maybe a
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  Speaker 2: few minutes. Then she tells them she needs to go
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  Speaker 2: back to her mom's apartment to use the bathroom.
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  Speaker 1: And that moment, that's it. That's the last confirmed innocent
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  Speaker 1: sighting of Xena.
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  Speaker 2: Thirty minutes past thirty minutes, and those same neighbors come back.
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  Speaker 2: They knock on Zena's door and ask her mother how
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  Speaker 2: she's doing, just assuming she'd been back inside the whole time.
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  Speaker 1: And that's that's the moment the world just stops for
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  Speaker 1: her mother.
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  Speaker 2: She realizes Zena isn't in the apartment. She never came back.
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  Speaker 1: A five year old girl vanishes, not from a park,
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  Speaker 1: not from a street, but inside her own building, on
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  Speaker 1: her own floor.
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  Speaker 2: The panic was just you need it, It was escalating
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  Speaker 2: so fast. The mother is searching everywhere, under beds, in closets,
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  Speaker 2: every corner of that apartment. She starts going floor by floor,
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  Speaker 2: screaming Zena's name, banging on every single door. A frantic
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  Speaker 2: crowd of neighbors starts to form their angel is gone.
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  Speaker 1: And as the search grows, two figures start to emerge.
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  Speaker 1: Both are seventeen year olds and both are right there
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  Speaker 1: participating in the search. The first is Alaha. He's the
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  Speaker 1: building's caretaker, right.
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  Speaker 2: He helps his uncle manage the place, and neighbors noticed
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  Speaker 2: something odd. He was physically shaking, just extremely nervous.
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  Speaker 1: But they just dismissed it.
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  Speaker 2: They dismissed it completely. They're thinking, was you know, Xena
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  Speaker 2: loved Allah, she was always joking with him. He was
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  Speaker 2: part of the community, so they just assumed he was
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  Speaker 2: terrified for And the second person moh Mood, another seventeen
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  Speaker 2: year old neighbor from the fifth floor, And the material
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  Speaker 2: is really clear on this. He was already viewed with
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  Speaker 2: a lot of suspicion in the building for what, like
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  Speaker 2: what kind of suspicions just strange behavior. People felt he
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  Speaker 2: had criminal tendencies. But still there he is right in
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  Speaker 2: the middle of the search party.
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  Speaker 1: And almost immediately the whole situation gets confusing. There are
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  Speaker 1: red herrings being thrown out deliberately.
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  Speaker 2: One neighbor says they heard a strange, loud noise coming
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  Speaker 2: from the lightwell the man war.
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  Speaker 1: Which is that vertical shaft that runs through the middle
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  Speaker 1: of the building.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly, but they couldn't say when they heard it. Other
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  Speaker 2: people check Xena's apartment windows, but her mom had iron
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  Speaker 2: bars on all of them, so an accidental fall from
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  Speaker 2: her own home was impossible.
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  Speaker 1: And this is where it gets really insidious. Ma Mood,
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  Speaker 1: the one everyone already distrusts. He goes right up to
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  Speaker 1: Zena's mother.
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  Speaker 2: And he tells her she should stop searching the building
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  Speaker 2: immediately and go to the police station to file a
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  Speaker 2: kidnapping report.
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  Speaker 1: Wait, so he's trying to get her to leave, the
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  Speaker 1: most important person in the search, he's trying to send
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  Speaker 1: her away.
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  Speaker 2: It's a clear attempt to get her out of the building.
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  Speaker 2: And then Mamoud's own mother adds to it. She claims
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  Speaker 2: she saw two strange looking men and the building an
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  Speaker 2: hour before Xena disappeared.
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  Speaker 1: So they're building a false narrative, an outside threat.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly controlling the chaos from within.
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  Speaker 1: The search has hit a wall. Everyone's frantic. They're looking
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  Speaker 1: for these strange men. But it's one of the suspects
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  Speaker 1: who breaks the deadlock.
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  Speaker 2: It's Allah, the nervous caretaker. He's the one who suggests.
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  Speaker 1: It suggests what he says.
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  Speaker 2: They should open the sealed access door to the lightwell
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  Speaker 2: the man war the very place that neighbor heard the noise.
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  Speaker 1: Wow, So they do it. They opened the.
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  Speaker 2: Door and what they see is just devastating. Zena is
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  Speaker 2: lying on the ground at the bottom of the shaft, unconscious.
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  Speaker 1: Oh no.
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  Speaker 2: She and her mother are rushed to the hospital, but
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  Speaker 2: the investigation later uncovered this truly cold detail. Allah and
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  Speaker 2: the mood followed them there.
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  Speaker 1: Not because they were concerned.
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  Speaker 2: No, they went to confirm that she was dead, to
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  Speaker 2: make sure their secret was safe.
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  Speaker 1: And despite everything the doctors tried to do, Xena died
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  Speaker 1: from her injuries. Her death just ignited this this social
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  Speaker 1: explode across the entire city.
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  Speaker 2: Once the police got involved, the dots connected terrifyingly fast.
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  Speaker 2: All that suspicious behavior from the two seventeen year old
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  Speaker 2: suddenly made perfect horrific.
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  Speaker 1: Sense, and the truth of what they did it was
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  Speaker 1: just the ultimate betrayal.
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  Speaker 2: What the investigation laid bare was a calculated, conspired act.
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  Speaker 2: But Mood and Allah had planned to sexually assault.
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  Speaker 1: Her, the five year old girl.
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  Speaker 2: They targeted her in that tiny window of time when
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  Speaker 2: she was walking back from the neighbor's apartment, alone in
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  Speaker 2: the hallway for just a few seconds.
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  Speaker 1: And Allah he used her trust.
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  Speaker 2: He used her trust completely. He distracted her to her
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  Speaker 2: he was a friend, so she walked with him, probably
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  Speaker 2: still playing. Mamood appeared and between the two of them
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  Speaker 2: they immobilized her.
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  Speaker 1: They didn't take her down the main stairs.
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  Speaker 2: No, they couldn't risk being seen. They dragged her up
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  Speaker 2: the service staircase, the one only caretakers use, all the
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  Speaker 2: way to an isolated room on the roof, up on.
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  Speaker 1: The roof, while everyone else was searching below.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, they tried to carry out the assault multiple times,
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: but they failed. And while this is happening, they started
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  Speaker 2: to hear the commotion from downstairs, the mother screams, doors banging,
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  Speaker 2: the search party growing louder.
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  Speaker 1: So they panicked.
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  Speaker 2: They panicked. They realized that if Xena was found alive,
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  Speaker 2: she would immediately identify them. The fear of that scandal
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  Speaker 2: of being exposed led to a cold lethal decision.
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  Speaker 1: They had to silence her.
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  Speaker 2: They grabbed her and threw her down the building central well.
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  Speaker 1: The man war to make it look like an accident,
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  Speaker 1: or at least to silence their only witness exactly, And.
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  Speaker 2: The final piece of the puzzle, the thing that sealed it,
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  Speaker 2: was a friend who actually went up to the roof
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  Speaker 2: during the search.
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  Speaker 1: He saw them.
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  Speaker 2: He saw both of them standing there, visibly nervous, while
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  Speaker 2: the whole building was in an uproar, and Allah told
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  Speaker 2: them explicitly stay quiet about seeing them up there.
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  Speaker 1: Unbelievable. The betrayal was just, it was total.
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  Speaker 2: The facts were horrific enough, but the aftermath of the
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  Speaker 2: crime brought this whole other level of intensity. Became a
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  Speaker 2: national crisis, right.
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  Speaker 1: This wasn't just a local tragedy anymore. It became what's
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  Speaker 1: known in Egypt as a katiyatrie on a major public issue.
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  Speaker 1: The community's reaction was massive.
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  Speaker 2: So personal. People painted Zena's face on walls all over
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  Speaker 2: the city. There were huge protests, the media mobilized, and
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  Speaker 2: everyone was demanding one thing, justice, swift, uncompromising justice. The
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  Speaker 2: primary call from the public from the media was for
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  Speaker 2: the death penalty execution.
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  Speaker 1: The crime was just seen as so heinous. Anything less
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  Speaker 1: would feel like a betrayal exactly.
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  Speaker 2: But this is where the legal system hit a brick wall.
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  Speaker 2: There was a very specific, very controversial law in place.
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  Speaker 2: What was that because a Law and Mahmoud were both seventeen,
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  Speaker 2: they were miners, and Egyptian law at the time prohibited
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  Speaker 2: the death penalty for miners, no matter how severe the crime.
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  Speaker 1: So their age protected them.
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  Speaker 2: It did, and this created a huge dilemma for the judiciary.
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  Speaker 2: The presiding judge even made a public statement about it.
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  Speaker 2: He said, and I'm paraphrasing, that if the law had
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  Speaker 2: allowed it, he absolutely would have sentenced them to death
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  Speaker 2: because of the sheer mass of their actions.
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  Speaker 1: A clash between the letter of the law and what
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  Speaker 1: the public saw as moral justice.
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  Speaker 2: A huge one. So in the end the law won.
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  Speaker 2: Both Allah and Mahmoud were sentenced to fifteen years of
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  Speaker 2: hard labor oshkalshaka. It was the maximum sentence the court
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  Speaker 2: could give a minor and I.
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  Speaker 1: Can't imagine that went overwhel not at all.
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  Speaker 2: It sparked even more mass protests. People were furious, demanding
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  Speaker 2: that the law be amended immediately. They felt that a
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  Speaker 2: crime this cruel forfeits any protection that age might offer, and.
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  Speaker 1: Then there is that detail about Mahmoud's father.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, that's something I've rarely ever seen. Mamoud's own
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  Speaker 2: father publicly disowned his son. He went on record to
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  Speaker 2: say how disgusted he was, and he actually asked the
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  Speaker 2: judge to give his own son the death penalty.
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  Speaker 1: Wow, a visceral rejection from his own family.
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  Speaker 2: The case of Xena, the Angel of port Side, it's
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  Speaker 2: just such a painful study, not just of a crime,
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  Speaker 2: but what happens when community trust completely fails. Her image
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  Speaker 2: is now a permanent symbol of lost innocence in Egypt.
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  Speaker 1: When don't we unpack all of this? What does it
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  Speaker 1: really mean for you the listener? This case forced an
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  Speaker 1: entire country to look at itself, at the social boundaries
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  Speaker 1: we just assume are there. But I think the real
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  Speaker 1: lasting legacy is legislative, isn't it.
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  Speaker 2: It is this forced a critical national debate that is
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  Speaker 2: still going on. When does a crime committed by someone
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  Speaker 2: who is technically a minor reach a level of malice
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  Speaker 2: so absolute that it overrides the protections we give to
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  Speaker 2: children in the justice system? How can any law balance rehabilitation,
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  Speaker 2: which is central to juvenile justice, against the public's demand
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  Speaker 2: for retribution when faced with such premeditated cruelty. It's a
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  Speaker 2: fundamental question, really about what justice even means when innocence
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  Speaker 2: is so completely destroyed