An Islamic court in Malaysia has sentenced a Muslim woman to be flogged with a rattan cane for having a beer in a nightclub, a court official said Tuesday. It is rare for a woman in Malaysia to be sentenced to caning – a punishment usually reserved for men in various crimes ranging from rape to bribery. It is generally done by specially trained officials at prisons.

Part-time model Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno was sentenced Monday to six lashes and a fine of 5,000 ringgit ($1,400) for consuming alcohol, said a Shariah High Court official who declined to be identified because he was not authorized to make public statements.

Shukarno, 32, pleaded guilty in the court in eastern Pahang state to a charge of drinking beer when Islamic authorities raided a hotel nightclub in August 2008.

Consuming alcohol is a religious offense in Malaysia only for Muslims, who make up nearly two-thirds of the population. Offenders are prosecuted in Shariah courts, which handle cases mainly related to family and moral issues for Muslims.

Shukarno plans to appeal the sentence, the New Straits Times daily reported.

The punishment “is aimed at making the accused repent and serves as a lesson to Muslims,” the newspaper quoted Judge Abdul Rahman Yunus as saying.

Via the Washington Post

A little digging in the archives reveals that Shukarno’s case was held over from earlier in the year, when a 22 year old woman was also sentenced to a caning. Back on 14 January, the Straits Times reported that:

A RELIGIOUS court has sentenced a Muslim woman to six strokes of the cane for drinking alcohol, possibly for the first time in Malaysia. The Syariah High Court in Pahang also handed the same sentence to a man on Monday, and is due to make a decision on another woman in May.

Mohamad Nasir Mohamad, 38, a father of four, and waitress Noorazah Baharuddin, 22, were found drinking beer separately in pubs in July last year in central Pahang state, said reports released yesterday…

The third accused was part-time model Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno, 32. According to the New Straits Times, Kartika, a Singapore permanent resident, could not attend court as she is studying in Singapore.

Judge Abdul Rahman Yunus said that he had given the maximum fine and caning as a deterrent to other Muslims, but had spared them a jail sentence.

‘The caning is to shame them and should be done at any of the prisons in the country,’ he was quoted as saying by NST.

Baharuddin was pictured leaving court on that occasion:

A lively debate from Tennessee in response a newspaper story yesterday that “according to one poll, 62 percent of Southern parents spank their kids”.

MellowBeth commented:

I find this article highly offensive. My parents are educated, and my mother isn’t even FROM Tennessee. And ya know what? I am also educated and was subject to a whooping when I needed one. And I’m fine. I’m in college on scholarships, I’m smart, I know my parents love me, and I have a great relationship with the two of them

Kris added her memories:

I remember getting spanked and having to pick out my own switches from the tree outside when i was a kid and i know that once i did i never did it again because i learned my leason! To this day i don’t wish my childhood was any different and love my mother to death for the way she raised me!

And on the paper’s site itself, Nashgirl40 observed:

Both of my parents were educated professionals who worked outside the home and both of them had no problem spanking me and my sisters…

My father actually spanked me with a belt, 5 times in my childhood. I can tell you what each one was for and I can tell you that I never did it again, making it very effective. We were also told growing up that if we got in trouble in school, we would get double at home. Guess what? None of us ever got in trouble in school.

I do not believe I was harmed in any way and people always commented to my parents about how well behaved their children were.

From a free spanking gallery on Spanking and Shame