Marcus Fakana sentenced to a year in prison

[Zippedydodah]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles]]]]
I cannot believe that this lad is going to spend a year in prison- yes, I know that’s the law there, he should have known better etc, etc
I hope that the girl’s mother is ashamed of her actions.
I don’t want to think what the impact will be on Marcus 😥

This is quite informative:

www.pulse.ng/articles/news/local/the-nigerian-age-of-consent-is-18-not-11-2024081621532039605

I got a virus alert when I clicked on that link!

Strange, I did not.

But there are various other websites that explain that age of consent laws are complex accross Nigeria, due to the way it's Criminal Code and separate Penal Code interplay with local laws, which results in lower ages of consent in its Northern states, in particular.

It's no secret Dubai has harsh rules, he is an adult, he was responsible for following the law. At the very least as the ones who picked the destination, his parents should have clued up on these laws and made sure he was aware if they thought he was too young/irresponsible to look them up himself.
If you plan on drinking or shagging about with strangers on holiday, the onus is on you to check the legalities like drinking age and age of sexual consent. It would not have been hard at all to find the information that the legal age for sex was 18, and he knew she wasn't 18. Isn't it also illegal to have pre marital sex in Dubai, so even if she was 18 he still would have been breaking the law of the country he was in. Usually overlooked for tourists or not, the law is the law.
He thought with his penis, had casual sex with a virtual stranger, and broke the law.

It is not on the girls mother that he's in prison. She is religious and believes pre marital sex is a sin, no doubt she's distressed her daughter had pre marital sex. It may not be her choice if her daughter follows the "rules" of the religion shes been raised in, but she was not wrong to report a sex crime having taken place.

At the end of the day, he's broken the law of the country he was in, and had sex with someone of an age they class as a minor. He's lucky to have been given the minimum custodial sentence. Yes, this will affect the rest of his life with a sex crime on his record, BUT it was a very simple thing to avoid, he made the conscious decision to have sex with that girl, knowing her age. Ignorance of the law of the country he was in, is not an excuse. He had every oppertunity to check the age of sexual consent just like you would check the legal age for drinking if you plan to drink.

No sympathy for him at all, it was completely avoidable and 100% down to his own decisions of sexual gratification over following the law.

What do you think about the almost 18 year old girl having casual sex with a virtual stranger in a country where it’s illegal?

But it's not illegal? The offence was (or appeared to be) that he had sex with an underage person, not that either of them had pre-marital sex.

I didn't initially post anything about his age, you and many others did

That's not really relevant to our discussion - I pointed out that you had misstated/misquoted what I had posted.

We are just going round in circles here

We are going round in circles because you keep adding layers of fluff to the point you want to make.

I could have replied to anyone but I replied to you

I don't believe that - your first post to me was very specific and I had a somewhat different point to make than the other posters.

The point I made remains the same, whether the age difference is 1 month , two months or a year - there is very little difference in their age! That is the point being made and it still remains relevant.

And I disagreed with your point up thread - fair enough we have different opinions. I think Marcus' team have a deliberate tactic of trying to make the age gap appear as small as possible without actually revealing his birthday. Their tactic is clearly working as we've had more posters on the thread today claiming the age difference is only 'Weeks' - when in fact it could be six months or more.

Yup.

To me, whether or not they gap is 2 weeks or 6+ months doesn't materially impact my view (generally, sympathetic to Marcus).

But there certainly seems to be some spin coming from his team, as to precisely how big the gap was, and I think it fair to assume that spin (if unfactual, as it does appear) is to generate greater sympathy.

And I say that having initially accepted the spin.

I'm not usually on Team Clav, but I think its a fair point (if not a key one, in my personal view) to mention.

And I am sticking to my point. I do not care if he is only 1 mth, 2mth or 1 whole year older than the young girl in question, the age difference between them is negligible. Had she been 17 and the male 50, then its an issue but they are both youngsters, exploring and got caught out.

Detained in Dubai said 10 weeks which is quite specific. I don’t honestly see why they’d lie given that the girl has already turned 18 and the age difference is negligible.

Radha Stirling, CEO of Detained in Dubai, tweeted 'one month' two weeks ago, she previously said 'a few months younger'.

I was responding to the tone of moral hyperbole mainly, but my understanding from listening to Radha Stirling was that the young girl would also have risked criminal proceedings had she been in the country when the complaint was filed.

I am finding this extremely odd. It's happened 4 or 5 times now.

I read 10 weeks yesterday. It’s splitting hairs anyway, and why attempt to cast aspersions on the motives of the organisation? They’re raising awareness and the more people who know what sort of place they’re going the better.

why attempt to cast aspersions on the motives of the organisation

Their immediate aim is to garner public sympathy for Marcus and put political pressure on the Labour government to assist in his case. It's not an aim I disagree with but I do like to be in possession of the facts.

Presumably the girl couldn't be tried as an adult though - unlike Marcus.

Would you feel the same way if she was 18 and him 17 and it was his parents that reported her and she was facing a future of always being branded a sexual offender?

Or would you still think it was just him thinking with his dick and she still wasn't thinking with her fanny?

What I have difficulty understanding is that if the mother was so religious and protective of her daughter is where she thought her daughter was when she was meeting up with Markus.

I went on a family holiday to Benidorm when I was a teenager (16) forty years ago and my mum’s mission on that holiday was to keep my sister and I away from the waiters and the group of English lads staying at the hotel.

The 20 years that he could have got would have been disproportionate. He was sentenced to one year, which they probably think is very lenient..and is definitely on the better end of the scale for him

The issue is the jail he is going to is pretty horrific. Prisoners are raped, beaten, infected with HIV - the prison guards do nothing, they are the worse offenders often. If he makes it out alive he’ll be lucky. Then he has a criminal record and is on the sex offender list. Plus the trauma.

All because of a holiday romance between an 18 and 17 year old in a country where the biggest mistake any of the families made was not researching all the laws correctly.

Somethings occurred to me and I actually don't know the answer.

We all talk of him being on the sex offenders register.

Does he actually get out on the register in the UK for something he was found guilty of abroad?

Does everyone who passes through our customs get flagged or something if they are on the register in their country?

I know..which means one year is definitely better than 20.
I have a lot of sympathy for him, but not researching the laws , which are perfectly easy to find, is a must when going abroad anywhere.
As I’ve said earlier on the thread, I sincerely hope he gets an early release. I think , given his age , he has been given a big enough shock and he learned a lesson. Maybe more than one.
It might be that he will get some protection as a foreigner. Dubai authorities won’t really want him to die/ get hiv..etc as a British person. UAE is supposed to have a special relationship’ with UK and this could sour things. After all, UAE puts a lot of money over here. I’m sure they’ll take us over at some point but that’s just me. Big trading partners too. So let’s hope they feel merciful

We have covered this. Many people would struggle to understand all the laws of every country they go and visit. Especially when such laws are open to corruption and misinterpretation.

Dubai sells itself as a glitzy tourist destination for Westerners. Does everyone who travels there research every law? Do they know you can get thrown in jail for WhatsApp messages and facebook posts? I didn’t know this. I do now. You couldn’t pay me to go there.

His family were a little naive to go there. I wouldn’t take teenage boys. But he definitely doesn’t deserve what will happen to him for the next year and the impact that will have on the rest of his life.

No. Convictions from other countries don’t show up on DBS checks. That’s why schools and nurseries are supposed to carry out overseas police checks on staff who have lived outside the UK.

The laws aren’t “perfectly easy to find”.

i’ve had a look and not only have the laws changed several times in the last 5 years, the laws are different depending on whether you’re emirati, Muslim, or some other ethnicity/religion. They’re also different depending on who reported it- if a husband or guardian reports something apparently it is then a much more serious crime.

originally the extramarital sex law was 14, 18 is a recent change.

then there’s your personal circumstances. Extramarital sex can be legal unless insert circumstance here

so no, it’s not a country where you can google “is x legal” because often the answer is “it depends”.

i have an intelligent boss who goes with her wife frequently. Apparently “it’s ok” and they don’t arrest gay couples any more, they are treated so well, everyone’s very courteous etc…