TAIF, 1 October 2006 — Housewives turned their faces in horror, fathers covered the eyes of their young children and policemen had their fair share of giggles when a South Asian streaker stood on a sidewalk close to the Al-Mekat Mosque in Taif happily waving his hands and baring all for groups of pilgrims going to Makkah on buses.
An onlooker who saw the man said, “He was totally naked, waving his hands in the air and smiling and laughing. The worse bit was when he would get into a frenzy and begin kicking his legs into the air. After a while he also began to cry.”
Maj. Muhammad Al-Osaimi, head of Al-Seel police station in Taif, arrested the man who was promptly taken to a mental hospital for a checkup. Police officers assumed the man was perhaps mentally deranged. Doctors then revealed that the man was not crazy but rather pretending to be insane.
The man was taken to a police station where police officers learned that he had been involved in the murder of another South Asian worker in Taif on the first day of Ramadan.
Police officers said the man made a pretense of being crazy to prompt the Saudi authorities to arrest and deport him to his home country. Police have detained the man pending an investigation.
