The Ministry of Justice and two prominent judges have harshly criticized the woman, suggesting that she was engaged in immoral behavior at the time of the attack.

The Justice Ministry published two statements on its Web site in recent days, saying that the woman had confessed to engaging in illicit acts and was undressed in a car before the rape.

Mr. Lahem, her lawyer, denied these accusations and said neither she or her male friend had confessed to any such acts. The lawyer is now suing the Ministry of Information and Culture for having distributed the Justice Ministry’s statements to the news media through the state-run Saudi Press Agency.

Human Rights Watch issued a statement this week insisting that the Justice Ministry “stop publishing statements aimed at damaging the reputation of a young Saudi rape victim who spoke out publicly about her ordeal and her efforts to find justice.” The ministry stopped short of accusing the rape victim of adultery, or zina in Arabic, which could carry the death penalty, for being alone with the man whom she met in his car on the night of the rape in 2006.

Mr. Lahem has complained that the judges seem to have based their conclusions about the events on the night of the rape on testimony of the seven rapists, who have been sentenced to five to seven years in jail. Under Islamic law, two people can be accused of adultery only if caught in the act by four male witnesses of good character.

Ibrahim bin Salih al-Khudairi, a judge on the Riyadh Appeals Court, said in an interview in the newspaper Okaz on Nov. 27 that if he had been a judge in the Qatif court, he would have sentenced the woman, her male companion and the seven rapists to death, and that they were lucky not to get the death penalty.

The woman met with an Associated Press reporter in November, before the court ordered her and her lawyer to stop talking to reporters. Describing the sentence as a “big shock,” she said that she had trouble sleeping and that her hands were trembling, The A.P. reported.