The Khamis Mushayt District Court has set July 7 as the date to hear a complaint brought by a judge against a Saudi female freelance journalist for “publishing erroneous information against the Saudi judiciary.” Mohammed Bin Ahmed Al-Zamil, lawyer for Judge Hamad Al-Razin, said the offending article, which was written under the title “Judge permits hitting overspending wives on face” and reported across the media and international legal organizations, was “an affront and a misrepresentation of the judge's words.” “We have taken up a private case, and if necessary we will take up a public case through the Ministry of Culture and Information,” Al-Zamil said. “I have hired a lawyer to represent me and I have made no contact with any judge in Khamis Mushayt,” Al-Razin said. “I have also omitted my title from all case documents, all so that the case proceeds according to regulations.” The complaint accuses the journalist and newspaper in question of “misrepresenting the judge's words by saying that he permitted husbands to hit their wives should they spend excessively on unnecessary items.”
