Filthy 15ft cell shared with rats and killers
CRAMMED into a filthy cell infested with rats, Laura Plummer has endured three months in one of Egypt’s most notorious prisons.
Her cell is a 15ft by 15ft concrete room shared with 25 violent inmates – including murderers, heroin addicts and prostitutes.
The repulsive conditions inside Hurghada women’s prison are enough to test Egypt’s worst criminals. Former inmates have told how they ‘wouldn’t keep a rat’ there.
No air conditioning means inmates are forced to spend their days festering in stifling heat reaching 40C (104F) in summer. There are no toilets save for a hole in the ground.
Miss Plummer’s family said she had become ‘unrecognisable’ as a result of her ordeal. She is having a nervous breakdown and has even contemplated suicide. They said that jail bosses mocked her complaints about the despicable conditions by telling her: ‘You’re not staying in the Sheraton!’
Her sister Jayne Sinclair claimed she was attacked by her fellow inmates because she is British. ‘She’s a target in there because she’s a foreigner,’ she said. ‘She was being kicked and kicked until apparently the cell leader started watching her.’
The inmate given the task of looking after Miss Plummer was locked up for slitting her best friend’s throat, her family added. Legal sources say Miss Plummer is enduring these conditions because she is being treated as an international drug smuggler. Next week she will be moved to Qena prison, a bleak facility in the middle of the desert halfway between Hurghada and Luxor.
In June 2013, a British tourist caught with three tons of cannabis resin told how he was kept in a 10ft by 8ft cell with no electricity or air conditioning.
Charles Ferndale said that prisoners were left to swelter in the scorching desert heat, with temperatures reaching an unbearable 48C (118F). ‘I just sit and sweat all day long,’ he said.
Relatives are allowed to visit once a month. According to reports, the entrance to the prison is flanked by armoured vehicles and guarded by armed soldiers and policemen.
The security is necessary because the prison, which opened in 1898, houses some of Egypt’s most notorious criminals and includes many political prisoners.
Many prisoners are kept in solitary confinement and those who are facing the death penalty must wear a red jumpsuit.
Miss Plummer’s sister Rachel said she believes she will be kept with other women at the prison and will move next week.