Iman al-Obeidi

Iman al-Obeidi (also spelled Eman al-Obeidy; Arabic: إيمان العبيدي pronounced [ʔiːˈmæːn əlʕʊˈbeːdi]; born circa 1982) is a former Libyan postgraduate law student who received worldwide media attention during the Libyan Civil War. This was because she burst into the restaurant of the Rixos Hotel in Tripoli and told the international press corps there that Libyan troops had beaten and gang-raped her. Her public statement challenged both the Gaddafi government and the taboo against discussing sex crimes in Libya. Government security forces dragged her out of the hotel to an unknown destination, and attacked journalists who tried to help her. Government representatives claimed she was drunk, mentally ill, a prostitute, and a thief, and said she would be charged with slander. The Washington Post described her as a "symbol of defiance against Gaddafi." She was released from government detention after three days, and was interviewed several times by Libya TV—an opposition satellite channel—and by CNN, during which she offered graphic details of her rape and subsequent detention by government officials. She fled Libya with a defecting military officer, who helped her cross into Tunisia, dressed in a Berber tribal costume to hide her identity. She was initially offered protection by European diplomats in Qatar and applied for refugee status there. After initially protecting her, in early June 2011 Qatar forcibly deported her back to Libya. On June 4, 2011, she was granted asylum in the United States with the help of Hillary Clinton. Al-Obeidi settled in Colorado under the name Eman Ali. She was later charged with a number of violent offenses, including a February 2014 assault on two patrons at a downtown bar in Boulder, Colorado for which she was convicted in May 2015 of a Class 4 felony.