MADINA: Umm Muhammad, the Saudi woman convicted and imprisoned for physically abusing her Indonesian housemaid in Madina, has claimed that the maid was suffering psychological problems when she arrived for work in the country. “Residents of the neighborhood where she lived in Indonesia called her crazy,” Umm Muhammad claimed. “When she arrived I noticed her acting strangely.” Umm Muhammad claims the maid urinated involuntarily and that she had asked the recruitment office to take her back. However, the recruitment official said that he could not do so because the maid was still working. “We (the family) decided to have her treated. My daughters took her to several hospitals but they all refused to examine her because she was on a trial period and still had no residency permit.” Umm Muhammad claimed that the maid used to hurt herself, including making cuts to her legs and scalp, “without showing any sign of pain”. “My daughter's housemaid happened to be from the same town, and she told me that she was known there for her weird behavior, hurting herself and others, and that they called her crazy,” said Umm Muhammad. Umm Muhammad alleged further that some woman called her on the phone and said she intended to accuse her (Umm Muhammad) on the Internet of torturing the housemaid. “I didn't take the call seriously.” She said she was shocked at the maid's accusation that resulted in her being imprisoned. She also claimed that the Indonesian embassy wanted one million riyal in exchange for dropping the case. “The lawyer and everybody at one court session saw her pulling out her nail without showing any pain, and I think that's evidence that she tortured herself,” said Umm Muhammad. Umm Muhammad's daughter, a laboratory specialist, claimed that she used to clean the cuts the maid allegedly inflicted on herself. The maid “used to remove the bandages and deepened the wounds”, claimed the daughter.
