THE two British nurses facing murder charges and possible beheading in Saudi Arabia will see their lawyer for the first time on Saturday, he said yesterday.
Salah al-Hejailan, who has long-standing ties with the British Embassy in Riyadh, was appointed to advise Lucille McLauchlan, 31, from Dundee, and Deborah Parry, 38, from Hampshire, earlier this week.
He will soon be issuing a public appeal to the family of Yvonne Gilford, the Australian nurse stabbed, beaten and smothered at the King Fahd Military Medical Complex on Dec 11, not to ask for the death penalty.
Miss Gilford's brother, Frank, initially said he was unlikely to grant clemency, but has since said he may consider doing so.
Mr al-Hejailan, who has 30 years' experience, believes the Saudi authorities will be keen to use the case to demonstrate the fairness of their system to the West.
"This case can become emotional only if the family of the victim ask for capital punishment," he said. "The Saudi judge will not even consider capital punishment unless they ask for it. If they do not then the case will not be difficult at all. The British authorities and the media should really concentrate on the family of the victim. It will be my major task to convince them, although I cannot do it alone.
"People change their minds sometimes. At the beginning they are emotional, then they realise there can be some media publicity, or some more money for them, and then they change their behaviour.
"I think it would be quite devastating for the Western world, with your set of values, if an Australian family is seen to be asking for capital punishment.
"If they declare forgiveness, a judge would not allow capital punishment. If they insist on capital punishment, a judge would consider it very seriously."
If the death penalty is not demanded prison terms of up to five years were likely, he said.
Mr al-Hejailan expects the case to be dealt with within a few weeks, and three lawyers from his company will visit the nurses in prison to collect evidence for the case.
According to the state-run Saudi Press Agency, a senior Saudi police official said the pair had admitted killing Miss Gilford, 55, for "personal motives". The official, who was not named, said the three had spent the evening of Miss Gilford's murder together.
"A row broke out concerning personal motives between the victim and Deborah, prompting the latter to resort to violence and to stab her," he said. "Lucille helped finish her off by choking her to death."
McLauchlan and Parry "clearly admitted" that version of events and "reconstituted the crime" at the scene of the crime, he said.
The women have allegedly been recorded on security cameras using Miss Gilford's credit cards.
According to reports, both women are retracting their confessions, but Mr al-Hejailan was unable to confirm them. He said that it was "very rare" for confessions to be retracted in Saudi Arabia, although it would be part of his job to "try to explain the state of mind when such a confession was made".
Deborah Parry was part of a team that cared for Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother when she had cataract surgery at the King Edward VII Hospital, central London, 18 months ago, a report claimed last night.
