Man who wanted to get wife’s hymen tested to nullify marriage drops case
Husayn Kassai, 31, wanted to make his marriage void on the grounds his wife wouldn't have sex with him.
A businessman who tried to get his wife to have a hymen examination in order to nullify their marriage has dropped his legal bid.
Husayn Kassai, 31, wanted a judge to declare his marriage to doctor Niloofar Tabarra void on the grounds it had not been consummated.
But Dr Tabarra denied this and said she had a text message from him proving they’d had sex in a hotel in Prague.
Instead, she wanted a divorce on the grounds that their relationship had been characterised by ‘domestic abuse and coercive control’, a hearing was told.
She added that her husband, co-founder of technology firm Onfido, had a company worth ‘millions of pounds’ and that lawyers said she wouldn’t have been able to claim any money if the marriage was nullified.
Today Mr Kassai, who studied economics and management at Oxford, agreed to divorce on the grounds he had behaved unreasonably, during the latest round of litigation.
Mr Justice Moor, who oversaw a virtual public hearing in the Family Division of the High Court, said the dispute was a ‘tragedy’ for both parties. He made no findings on Dr Tabarra’s allegations of domestic abuse.
The judge heard how the couple tied the knot in June 2018 and that their marriage effectively lasted for just six months.
He said attempts to nullify marriages on the grounds of non-consummation were very rare and caused ‘great angst and upset’, emphasising that the union needed to be dissolved as quickly as possible.
Representing Dr Tabarra, also 31, barrister Charlotte Proudman said Mr Kassai originally petitioned for nullity because of his wife’s ‘wilful refusal’ to have sex with him.
But in a written case outline, the lawyer said her client ‘makes plain that the marriage was consummated once… whilst on holiday in Prague’.
She points to a text message from Mr Kassai to his wife where he says, ‘let’s head back to the hotel so we can have even better sex than last night’.
The court heard how Dr Tabarra had been a virgin before marriage and that Mr Kassai wanted her to undergo a hymen examination to prove she still was one.
Dr Proudman said such a procedure would have been ‘highly abusive’.
Representing Mr Kassai, barrister Sarah Phipps, said her client was ‘clear that this marriage was not consummated’.
In a case outline, she wrote: ‘Before the court is a case which has become an expensive litigation quagmire.
‘This would be regrettable in any case; it is particularly unfortunate in one which involves two young, well-educated people who have no children and were married for only six months.
‘Almost every point is contested, almost every fact disputed. That said, the parties do agree on one thing: that their marriage was an unhappy disaster. Neither of them has a positive word to say about it.
‘None of the wife’s allegations against the husband, or anyone else, have been proven and thus cannot be taken as being true.’
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