Middle-east Arab News Opinion | Asharq Al-awsat

Egyptian Court Sentences 12 to Death Penalty, 140 for Life in Prison | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT English Archive 2005 -2017
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Police officers stand guard inside courtroom defendants sit in a cage, Cairo, Egypt, June 17, 2017.


Cairo– An Egyptian court sentenced 12 to death and 140 others to life in prison convicted of storming into a police station some four years ago in Menya and killing a police officer.

In 2013, former supporters Egyptian President Morsi broke into Matay police station in Minya Province, killing the station’s chief in retaliation. The incident followed the forced dispersal of mass protests in Cairo’s Rabaa el-Adawiya and el-Nahda squares.

According to Egypt’s penal code, the Grand Mufti Shawki Allam must review all death sentences.

Allam has already approved the verdicts, although his opinion is legally required but not binding.

Menya Court sentenced 140 defendants to life in the same case, while it acquitted 238 others.

In 2014, the court ruled death penalty to 37 defendants and the sentence was appealed.

Over the past four years, the court issued dozens of death sentences for hundreds of Muslim Brotherhood members and supporters, including leaders, and thousands were sentenced to life in prison. The court of appeal annulled many of the rulings and ordered retrials.

Giza Criminal Court, decided to postpone reviewing the retrial of 4 defendants, including Tarek al-Nahry, into the case known as “Cabinet incidents case” to the hearing of 17 October 2017. Nahry’s lawyer has attended the hearing in accordance with the amendments to the recent Code of Criminal Procedure.

Nahry was sentenced to life in prison in absentia before he surrendered himself for retrials.

Judges Wajih al-Shaer, Wajdi Abul Menem, and Husam Ezzedine convicted the defendants of assaulting government institutions, setting them ablaze, vandalism, murdering a policeman, arson, and association with a terrorist organization.

The defendants vandalized and broke into several institutions such as the Shura council, parliament, and cabinet building.